Scribd
Upload
30 views2 pages

Led Zeppelin Wins Long Stairway To Heaven' Copyright Case - The New York Times

Uploaded by

odiassilva
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
30 views2 pages

Led Zeppelin Wins Long Stairway To Heaven' Copyright Case - The New York Times

Uploaded by

odiassilva
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

https://www.nytimes.

com/2020/10/05/arts/music/stairway-to-heaven-led-zeppelin-
lawsuit.html

Led Zeppelin Wins Long ‘Stairway to Heaven’


Copyright Case
The U.S. Supreme Court announced it would not hear the case, leaving in place an
appeals court ruling that the band did not copy part of a 1968 song by Spirit.

By Ben Sisario

Oct. 5, 2020

The long road of a copyright suit over Led Zeppelin’s 1971 megahit “Stairway to Heaven”
came to an end on Monday, when the United States Supreme Court announced that it had
declined to hear the case.

The high court’s decision means that a ruling for Led Zeppelin in March by the United
States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will stand. That ruling affirmed Led
Zeppelin’s victory at a trial in 2016 over a challenge led by a trustee representing
“Taurus,” a 1968 song by the psychedelic band Spirit.

“Taurus,” written by Randy Wolfe — better known as Randy California, the nickname
Jimi Hendrix gave him — has long drawn comparisons to the pastoral opening segment
of “Stairway to Heaven,” a staple of rock radio that, by some estimates, has earned more
than $500 million. The two songs share similar chord progressions and a bass line that
descends along a chromatic scale.

When the case was filed in 2014, it may have seemed a run-of-the-mill copyright
infringement fight, if an especially high-profile one. But the case came to embody some
of the most contested questions in music law today, including exactly what is covered by
the registration documents of old songs and whether copyright can be claimed over
common chord progressions or short sequences of notes.

The case drew intense interest in the music industry, which had been reeling since a jury
found in 2015 that Robin Thicke’s hit “Blurred Lines” had copied Marvin Gaye’s 1977 song
“Got to Give It Up.” Even the Trump administration weighed in, with the Justice
Department filing a brief in support of Led Zeppelin.
The ruling by the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, caught the attention of lawyers and
other judges. The court said that when it comes to works involving generic or
commonplace elements, only a minimal, or “thin,” level of copyright applies to them, and
that to prevail a plaintiff must show that another work is “virtually identical” to theirs.
The decision effectively placed a hurdle in front of many plaintiffs in music copyright
cases.

The appellate judges also held that for musical compositions before 1978, when a new law
took effect, only the material on the sheet music submitted to the Copyright Office
(sometimes called a deposit copy) was legally protected. For songs like “Taurus,” where
only a basic sketch had been submitted, it meant that many of the notes heard on a
recording were not covered by copyright — and thus could not be infringed upon.

The Ninth Circuit’s ruling had an immediate impact and was widely seen as giving an
advantage to defendants in music copyright cases, which often include pop stars and the
companies that release their music and typically control their copyrights.

Citing the appeals court’s decision, a federal judge in March threw out a jury’s $2.8
million verdict against Katy Perry, who had been found to copy an eight-note melodic
pattern from a Christian rap song. A New York judge also cited the Led Zeppelin decision
in a case involving Ed Sheeran’s song “Thinking Out Loud,” which was said to have
copied another Gaye classic, “Let’s Get It On.”

The Sheeran case is scheduled to go to trial next month. But last week, lawyers for the
singer asked the judge for a delay because, they said, Sheeran and other witnesses, who
are British citizens, may not enter the United States under current coronavirus travel
restrictions.
Ben Sisario covers the music industry for The New York Times. More about Ben Sisario

A version of this article appears in print on , Section B, Page 3 of the New York edition with the headline: Supreme Court Won’t Hear ‘Stairway to
Heaven’ Copyright Case

Sign up for The Amplifier newsletter, for Times subscribers only. Your
alternative to the algorithm — a real, live human helps you discover
songs you’ll love. Try it for 4 weeks.

You might also like