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SAN FRANCISCO – A US Court of Appeals on Friday ordered a new trial in a lawsuit accusing Led Zeppelin of copying an obscure instrument from the 1960s for the introduction of his 1971 classic "Stairway to Heaven."
A jury of the Federal Court in Los Angeles two years ago found that Led Zeppelin had not copied the famous riff of the song "Taurus" from the Spirit band. But the panel of three judges of the US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously ruled that the lower court judge had provided the jury with erroneous instructions. He returned the case to court for another trial.
A telephone message left by Led Zeppelin's lawyer, Peter Anderson, was not immediately returned.
Michael Skidmore, an estate trustee of former Spirit guitarist, Randy Wolfe, filed a lawsuit against Led Zeppelin in 2015.
The jury handed down their verdict for Led Zeppelin after a five-day trial in which group members Jimmy Page and Robert Plant testified. Mr. Page and Mr. Plant, who wrote the words of "Stairway", stated that their creation was an original.
The jury found that "Stairway to Heaven" and "Taurus" were not substantially similar, according to the decision of the Ninth Circuit.
But the US District Judge, R. Gary Klausner, failed to advise the jurors that certain elements of a song, such as his notes or his scale, might not benefit from the protector's protection. right of author. Paez.
Judge Klausner also wrongly declared to jurors that copyright does not protect chromatic scales, arpeggios or short sequences of three notes, according to the Ninth Circuit panel.
"This error was not inoffensive because it undermined the testimony of Skidmore's expert that Led Zeppelin copied a color scale used in an original way," said Judge Paez.
The panel also found another misleading jury instruction.
The trial brought together jurors and lucky observers who made their way into the courtroom in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the Californian jazz and rock band Spirit s & # 39 is imposed. based.
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