The British pop star acquitted by a Manhattan jury after a six-day trial in which her “Thinking out loud” was thoroughly analyzed
by Francesco Prisco
He had threatened to leave the music in case of a contrary verdict. And instead fans can breathe the proverbial sigh of relief: Ed Sheeran has won the plagiarism case brought against him by the heirs of the co-author of Let’s get it ona super classic by Marvin Gaye that would have been too “similar” to his Thinking out loud. After a two-week trial, a Manhattan jury ruled that Sheeran did not infringe copyright. The decision marks the culmination of a years-long battle between the British artist and the heirs of Ed Townsend who co-wrote the 1973 track.
Townsend’s estate, in a lawsuit initially filed in 2016, accused Sheeran of copying elements of the Marvin Gaye song into his 2014-released track. Final testimony was heard in court Wednesday: US District Court Judge Louis Stanton told a Manhattan jury that “independent creation is a complete defense, no matter how similar the song.”
Stanton’s statement follows a lengthy exchange of evidence in which both sides argued about another song’s similarity to Thinking Out Loud: Georgy Girla 1967 hit by Australian folk-pop group The Seekers. Georgy Girl was adduced as further evidence by Lawrence Ferrara, an expert musicologist brought in by Sheeran’s team, to prove that Let’s Get It On e Thinking Out Loud use a common chord progression. Ferrara allegedly told the jurors that Thinking Out Loud it uses chords and rhythms that are common “building blocks” of pop music. Ergo: there was no plagiarism.
