Court rules that Ed Sheeran did not steal song idea from Marvin Gaye's Let's Get It On

Marvin Gaye performs onstage during the 'Sexual Healing' tour at Radio City Music Hall, New York, New York, May 19, 1983.
(Image credit: Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)

Ed Sheeran has won a courtroom victory after it was ruled his song Thinking Out Loud did not infringe on the copyright of Marvin Gaye's Let's Get It On.

English pop star Sheeran first faced plagiarism accusations in 2016 when the family of Let's Get It On co-writer Ed Townsend sued. That case was dismissed the following year, but in 2018 Structured Asset Sales – a company which owns part of the royalties for Let's Get It On – claimed Sheeran stole the chord progression and rhythm for Marvin Gaye's hit.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has now ruled that Sheeran's 2014 hit did not infringe on the copyright.

The court said that the two songs share only "fundamental musical building blocks" and added that that to rule in Structured Asset Sales' favour would be detrimental to the creativity of artists everywhere.

The judges' ruling continued: "The four-chord progression at issue – ubiquitous in pop music – even coupled with a syncopated harmonic rhythm, is too well-explored to meet the originality threshold that copyright law demands. Overprotecting such basic elements would threaten to stifle creativity and undermine the purpose of copyright law."

It's not the first time a contemporary pop star has faced a lawsuit over similarities between one of their songs and a rock classic.

In 2015, Tom Petty settled out of court with Sam Smith after similarities were pointed out between Smith’s hit single Stay With Me and Petty’s 1989 track I Won’t Back Down.

One of the more bizarre music plagiarism cases came in 1982 when Creedence Clearwater Revival's John Fogerty was sued for plagiarising himself.

Ed Sheeran - Thinking Out Loud (Official Lyric Video) - YouTube Ed Sheeran - Thinking Out Loud (Official Lyric Video) - YouTube
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Marvin Gaye - Let's Get It On - YouTube Marvin Gaye - Let's Get It On - YouTube
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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.