Lately it seems as though Ed Sheeran has been blessed with the Midas touch because all of his work becomes a huge global success. Just take a look at his latest song’s triumph; ‘Shape of You’ has been leading Billboard’s Hot 100 charts for 11 consecutive weeks.
Lately it seems as though Ed Sheeran has been blessed with the Midas touch because all of his work becomes a huge global success. Just take a look at his latest song’s triumph; ‘Shape of You’ has been leading Billboard’s Hot 100 charts for 11 consecutive weeks.
However, it seems as though his song ‘Photograph’ is doing the exact opposite. The singer had been sued last year for copyright infringement by songwriters Thomas Leonard and Martin Harrington. According to the BBC, the songwriters claimed that ‘Photograph’ had a similar structure to their song, ‘Amazing’.
They also contested that the chorus of the two songs shared 39 identical notes, with similarities “instantly recognisable to the ordinary observer”.
In a complaint lodged in the US in July, they said: “This copying is, in many instances, verbatim, note-for-note copying, makes up nearly one half of ‘Photograph’, and raises this case to the unusual level of strikingly similar copying.”
Richard Busch, who represented Harrington and Leonard, confirmed to the BBC that the claim has now been settled but he did not comment on the settlement terms.
Ed Sheeran’s ‘Photograph reached number 10 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number 15 in the UK singles chart.
