Ed Sheeran wins Shape of You copyright case and hits out at 'baseless' claims

Editor Katie Watkin's  6 /04/ 22

Global star Ed Sheeran has finally won a High Court copyright battle over his 2017 hit Shape of You.  

A judge ruled on Wednesday that the singer-songwriter had not plagiarised the 2015 song Oh Why by Sami Chokri.  Chokri, a grime artist who performs under the name Sami Switch, had claimed the "Oh I" hook in Sheeran's track was "strikingly similar" to an "Oh why" refrain in his own track.  

After the ruling, Sheeran said such "baseless" claims "are way too common".  Ed Sheeran hits out at 'baseless' copyright claims In a video on social media, he said there was now a culture "where a claim is made with the idea that a settlement will be cheaper than taking it to court, even if there's no basis for the claim".  

The singer added: "It's really damaging to the song writing industry. There's only so many notes and very few chords used in pop music.  

"Coincidence is bound to happen if 60,000 songs are being released every day on platforms like  Spotify. That's 22 million songs a year and there's only 12 notes that are available." 

The singer single  Shape of You and Sami Chokri's Oh Why  Shape of You was the UK's best-selling song of 2017 in the UK and is Spotify's most-streamed ever.  

Judge Antony Zacaroli ruled that Sheeran had "neither deliberately nor subconsciously copied" Chokri's song.  

He acknowledged there were "similarities between the one-bar phrase" in Shape of You and Oh Why, but said "such similarities are only a starting point for a possible infringement" of copyright.  

After studying the musical elements, he said there were "differences between the relevant parts" of the songs, which "provide compelling evidence that the 'Oh I' phrase" in Sheeran's song "originated from sources other than Oh Why".  

 He added that there was only a "speculative foundation" for the defence's case that Sheeran had heard Chokri's song before writing Shape of You. 

"I find, as a matter of fact, that he had not heard it," he said.  Sheeran wrote his chart-topping track with two collaborators, Snow Patrol's John McDaid and producer Steven McCutcheon, who all denied having previously heard Oh Why.  

The case dates back to 2018, when the trio asked the High Court to declare they had not infringed the copyright of Chokri and his co-writer Ross O'Donoghue. 

That led to an 11-day trial in London last month.  

 In the end, the judge disagreed. In order for copyright infringement to be proved, Chokri needed to prove that Sheeran had listened to his song - otherwise the similarities would just be coincidence. 

But Mr Justice Zacaroli said Chokri's team had failed to establish that Oh Why had ever graced Sheeran's speakers.  

As a star who has faced his fair share of copyright claims, Sheeran will presumably hope this verdict makes future litigants think twice. 

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