Somto Bisina
Ed Sheeran has been acquitted of copyright infringement in Manhattan federal court on Thursday. The charge stemmed from a claim that Sheeran had plagiarized Marvin Gaye’s ’70s hit “Let’s Get It On” for his own 2014 pop hit “Thinking Out Loud.”
After just a few hours of deliberation, the jury found Sheeran not liable for copyright infringement. U.S. District Court Judge Louis Stanton had instructed the jury that “Independent creation is a complete defense, no matter how similar that song is.”
Join our WhatsApp ChannelStanton’s instructions left a high bar for the plaintiffs’ attorneys to prove that Sheeran and his co-writer actually copied Gaye’s 1973 song “Let’s Get It On.” They needed to “prove by a preponderance of the evidence… that Sheeran actually copied and wrongfully copied ‘Let’s Get It On’” – as opposed to the coincidental, negligible similarities argued by Sheeran’s attorneys.
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In the closing arguments, Sheeran’s attorney, Ilene Farkas, referred back to the plaintiffs’ contention that the singer’s concert mashup of the two songs constituted “a smoking gun” and “a confession.”
Farkas said, “He did a mashup one night. That’s a plaintiff’s confession, their smoking gun?… Simply put: the plaintiff’s ‘smoking gun’ was shooting blanks.”
Before the case was left with the jury, Farkas had told the jurors that similarities in chords or rhythm, as opposed to melody and lyrics, were “the letters of the alphabet of music… These are basic musical building blocks that songwriters now and forever must be free to use, or all of us who love music will be poorer for it.”
Sheeran had testified earlier in the week and claimed that he would quit the industry if found guilty. “If that happens, I’m done, I’m stopping,” he said. “I find it really insulting to devote my whole life to being a performer and a songwriter and have someone diminish it.”
The verdict will come as a relief to Sheeran as it coincides with the release of his new album and a Disney+ documentary series.
