Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven copyright infringement trial starts May 10th

Led Zeppelin’s lead singer Robert Plant and guitarist Jimmy Page must face a US jury trial over whether they stole opening chords for their 1971 classic Stairway to Heaven. In a decision on Friday, US district judge Gary Klausner in Los Angeles said the song and the 1967 instrumental Taurus by the band Spirit were similar enough to let a jury decide whether Plant and Page were liable for copyright infringement.

A trial is scheduled for May 10th. The lawsuit was brought by Michael Skidmore, a trustee for the late Randy Wolfe, also known as Randy California, who was Spirit’s guitarist and the composer of Taurus. Skidmore said Page may have been inspired to write Stairway to Heaven for Led Zeppelin after hearing Spirit perform Taurus while the bands toured together in 1968 and 1969, but that Wolfe never got credit. 

The defendants said Wolfe was a songwriter-for-hire who had no copyright claim, and that the chord progressions were so clichéd that they did not deserve copyright protection. But the judge said a jury could find “substantial” similarity between the first two minutes of Stairway to Heaven and Taurus, which he called “arguably the most recognizable and important segments” of the songs.

The judge also said the trustee could get only 50% of any damages awarded, citing a 1967 contract that Wolfe signed. “This case, from our perspective, has always been about giving credit where credit was due, and now we get to right that wrong,” said Francis Malofiy, a lawyer for Skidmore.

Source: The Guardian
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