Ed Sheeran is not retiring: he won his plagiarism case

Ed Sheeran has gone through a second trial for alleged plagiarism in his music. In 2022, he was sued over his track 'Shape of You.' He won that case, but it wasn't fun. In April-May 2023, the dispute was about his single 'Thinking Out Loud.' It made Sheeran very frustrated.

In the Manhattan Court where he successfully defended himself against claims that he stole from the famous Marvin Gaye song 'What's Going On,' Sheeran indicated that he'd had it. If the court were to find him guilty of making a song that sounded too much like Gaye's, he declared, "I'm done. I'm stopping."

Sheeran found the accusations "really insulting." He told the court that he developed greatly as a songwriter, going from "writing one to two songs a day as a teenager to now writing eight to nine songs daily," People reported. But that didn't mean he was making shortcuts and copying tunes.

Ed Sheeran's court case, which started in the last week of April 2023, made headlines several times. The singer even played parts of his song for the court. As the Huffington Post UK said: "Ed whipping out his guitar and treating those present to a musical interlude and, at one point, the judge warning the jurors against dancing in court," made for remarkable stories.

After comparing the songs and listening to experts, plaintiffs, and the defendant, the jury sided with Ed Sheeran. He was cleared of the charge of plagiarism.

You can also decide for yourself. If you have a music streaming service, listen to the following two songs in a row: Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get it On' from 1973 and Ed Sheeran's 'Thinking Out Loud' from 2015. Do they sound alike to you?

According to the copyright owners of Marvin Gaye's song, the songs have a lot in common, and they sued the British singer for plagiarism, demanding millions of dollars.

With a fortune estimated at 200 million dollars, according to the website Celebrity Net Worth, Ed Sheeran faced a lawsuit for approximately 100 million dollars.

In the picture, Ed Sheeran and his partner Cherry Seaborn. They have two children together.

The federal judge in Manhattan, Louis Stanton, accommodated legal action against Ed Sheeran for alleged plagiarism of one of his best-known songs: 'Thinking Out Loud'. Stanton believed that a jury would be the one to decide.

The song from which the complainants consider Ed Sheeran's work a partial rip-off is Marvin Gaye's classic, 'Let's Get It On,' released in 1973. They believe he has taken elements from the original song without reimbursing the people owning the rights to the song.

Billboard followed the lawsuit about the alleged breach of copyright closely. It claims that there may be at least a couple of elements in Ed Sheeran's song that reportedly came from Marvin Gaye's. Yet, the claim for millions of dollars in copyright was found unjust by the jury.

Billboard cited the judge in saying: "There is no bright-line rule that the combination of two unprotectable [sic] elements is insufficiently numerous to constitute an original work." The litigators had to prove that the use of parts resembling someone else's song, even if they are very small, was something to be paid for.

Fans of Ed Sheeran experienced deja-vu when looking at this case, because in 2016, the family of Ed Townsend, the co-author of the classic song with Marvin Gaye, had already sued the British singer for the same thing. Their lawsuit was dismissed the following year.

In 2018, however, the Townsend family sold a third of their shares for the rights to 'Let's Get It On' to the company Structured Asset Sales, and they decided to give it another shot and sue Ed Sheeran as new complainants.

David Pullman, president of Structured Asset Sales, claims that 'Thinking Out Loud' has taken melodic, harmonic, rhythmic, instrumental, and musical dynamic elements from the legendary song ('Let's Get it On') by Marvin Gaye. He made the statement to Billboard.

The businessman was optimistic about the fact that it would be a jury trial and thought he'd have "more success in this case" than the results of the Townends' litigation in 2016. But Pullman was wrong.

Pullman claimed it was "the largest copyright infringement in history." He made no secret of his delight at the multi-million dollar amount he might gain from the process.

Despite being in his early 30s, Ed Sheeran has already had to face another trial for plagiarism in April 2022.

On that occasion, it was the High Court of London that sided with him, considering that his great hit, 'Shape of You', had not plagiarized 'Oh Why', by Sami Chokri, released in 2015.

As a result, it was the plaintiff who had to pay the million dollars that the trial cost.

In the latest court case, the amounts of money disputed were much greater than just a million. Even though the jury took Sheeran's side, it was clear from his remarks to the court that he was fed up with the suits.