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Ed Sheeran wants to clear his name at copyright trial

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Marie-Louise Gumuchian, Reuters 

<div class="embed-wrap"><figure data-feedback="fb:likes,fb:comments"><img alt="Ed Sheeran arrives for the 42nd Brit Awards ceremony at The O2 Arena in London, Britain in this February 8, 2022 file photo. Vickie Flores, EPA-EFE" src="https://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2022/overseas/03/09/edsheeran.jpg"/><figcaption>Ed Sheeran arrives for the 42nd Brit Awards ceremony at The O2 Arena in London, Britain in this February 8, 2022 file photo. Vickie Flores, EPA-EFE</figcaption></figure></div>LONDON -- British chart-toppper Ed Sheeran sang part of his 2017 mega hit &quot;Shape Of You&quot; in court on Tuesday in a copyright trial over the song, and said melodies can sound similar without being copied.The chart-topper is in a legal battle with grime artist Sami Chokri, who performs as Sami Switch, and music producer Ross O&#x27;Donoghue, who argue &quot;Shape of You&quot; infringes &quot;particular lines and phrases&quot; from their 2015 song &quot;Oh Why.&quot;<ul class="op-related-articles">	<li><a href="https://news.abs-cbn.com/entertainment/03/08/22/ed-sheeran-denies-borrowing-ideas-in-shape-of-you">Ed Sheeran denies borrowing ideas in &#x27;Shape of You&#x27; copyright trial</a></li></ul>On his second day of questioning by Chokri and O&#x27;Donoghue&#x27;s lawyer Andrew Sutcliffe, Sheeran sang the &quot;Oh I&quot; hook and lines from songs including Nina Simone&#x27;s &quot;Feeling Good&quot; in the same key to show how melodies can sound alike.Chokri and O&#x27;Donoghue say the &quot;Oh I&quot; hook in &quot;Shape Of You&quot; is &quot;strikingly similar&quot; to the &quot;Oh Why&quot; hook in their song and that it was &quot;extremely likely&quot; Sheeran had previously heard their track. Sheeran and his co-writers have denied this.Asked about the similarities between the &quot;Oh Why&quot; and &quot;Oh I&quot; hooks, Sheeran repeatedly told the High Court in London: &quot;They&#x27;re both pentatonic scales and they both use vowels.&quot;Sutcliffe questioned him extensively over the writing of the song in October 2016 with co-authors Steven McCutcheon and John McDaid, and changes made as it was developed.The court was played recordings of Sheeran singing the hook in different pitches, called stacking.&quot;It sounds like you were singing &#x27;Oh Why&#x27;,&quot; Sutcliffe told Sheeran, who replied: &quot;I was singing &#x27;Oh I&#x27;.&quot;&quot;The lyric is &#x27;Oh I, I&#x27;m in love with your body&#x27;. The lyric &#x27;Oh Why, I&#x27;m in love with your body&#x27; does not make sense.&quot;Sheeran said an early &quot;Shape of You&quot; version had &quot;Heya&quot; as a hook but that was changed after sounding similar to a line in &quot;No Diggity&quot; by Blackstreet.He was also questioned about originally wanting to reference a melody from TLC&#x27;s &quot;No Scrubs.&quot; In his witness statement, Sheeran said an attempt to clear this was made but eventually the relevant part of his song was changed. The &quot;No Scrubs&quot; writers were later given a credit on &quot;Shape of You.&quot;Legal proceedings between the two parties date back to 2018 when Sheeran, McCutcheon and McDaid asked the High Court to declare they had not infringed Chokri and O&#x27;Donoghue&#x27;s copyright for &quot;Oh Why.&quot; Chokri and O&#x27;Donogue later filed a counterclaim alleging infringement.Sutcliffe said Sheeran, McDaid and McCutcheon&#x27;s original move aimed to deter later claims due to large legal costs.Sheeran denied this, adding: &quot;Me, Johnny and Steve are here to clear our name.&quot;He said he had &quot;disappeared for the entire year&quot; in 2016 and was not actively following the UK music scene.&quot;You&#x27;re an excessive music squirrel. You consume music voraciously,&quot; Sutcliffe told Sheeran. &quot;I am a music fan, I like music, I listen to music,&quot; Sheeran replied.On Monday, Sheeran said he had not been aware of Switch at the time he is accused of ripping off parts of &quot;Oh Why,&quot; and had never heard the song before the court case. Sheeran became briefly irked when a piece of his unreleased music was played. The court was told that the wrong folder on McCutcheon&#x27;s laptop had been accidentally opened.

British chart-toppper Ed Sheeran sang part of his 2017 mega hit 'Shape Of You' in court on Tuesday in a copyright trial over the song, and said melodies can sound similar without being copied.

Ed Sheeran wants to clear his name at copyright trial

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Ed Sheeran wants to clear his name at copyright trial

Marie-Louise Gumuchian,

Reuters

Published March 09, 2022 11:13 AM PHT

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Updated March 09, 2022 12:22 PM PHT

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Ed Sheeran

Shape of You

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