Final testimony in Ed Sheeran plagiarism trial: how 'Let's Get It On,' 'Thinking Out Loud,' and 'Georgy Girl' share a groove

Deliberations began Wednesday in a lawsuit alleging Sheeran's "Thinking Out Loud," stole from Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On." First, though, jurors learned about 'Georgy Girl.'

• Ed Sheeran insists his 2014 hit, 'Thinking Out Loud,' doesn't plagiarize Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get It On.'
• Deliberations in the federal copyright trial began briefly on Wednesday in Manhattan.
• Final testimony explored, for comparison, two very uncool versions of the already square '60s hit 'Georgy Girl.' 

Testimony has wrapped in the "Let's Get It On" plagiarism trial in federal court in Manhattan, where singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran has insisted for a week that his 2014 hit, "Thinking Out Loud," did not steal from the 1973 Marvin Gaye soul masterpiece.

But before closing statements could begin Wednesday afternoon in the fascinating case — which asks, in essence, whether a song's chord pattern and harmonic rhythm, essentially its "groove," can be stolen — "Georgy Girl" reared its, or her, decidedly uncool head.

The cornball, 1966-chart-topping pop song was debated by both sides in court as Sheeran watched from the defense table and the heirs of "Let's Get It On" co-composer Ed Townsend watched from the plaintiff table.

As improbable as it may sound, Townsend's soulful "Let's Get It On," Sheeran's earnest "Thinking Out Loud," and the breezy, cheesy Australian import "Georgy Girl" all share the same groove, according to Sheeran's expert musicologist.

All three songs use the same common four-chord progression — known as the I, iii, IV, V progression in music parlance. And in all three, the chords are struck with the same jittery, "anticipated" rhythm, with the second and fourth chords hitting before, not on, the beat.

There's a caveat to that odd, three-way comparison, Sheeran's musicologist, Dr. Lawrence Ferrar, told jurors just before testimony wrapped Wednesday.

You can't go by the version of "Georgy Girl" that infected US radios in the late 60s, he explained.

Rather, it's the 101 Strings Orchestra version, and the Boston Pops Orchestra version, of "Georgy Girl" that use the exact chord progression and rhythmic anticipation as "Let's Get It On," Sheeran's expert said.

Leaving aside the strangeness of having one of the most soulful songs in the Western canon, "Let's Get It On," compared in open court to two easy-listening renditions of "Georgy Girl," the comparison is highly significant to the plagiarism defense.

Sheeran's expert testified Wednesday that he found four songs — "Georgy Girl" and three others — that used that exact chord-rhythm combination, and did so before "Let's Get It On" did.

One was the 1962 Motown hit by The Contours, "Do You Love Me (Now That I Can Dance)," which later generations know from the movie "Dirty Dancing."

But the others — there's also a 1966 cover of the Temptations' "Since I Lost My Baby" — are "highly obscure" recordings, plaintiff attorney Patrick R. Frank, pointed out in cross-examining Sheeran's musicologist Wednesday.

Sheeran's musicologist had to go to "extreme lengths," scraping the bottom of the obscurity barrel, to come up with just four examples of the chord-rhythm pattern shared by "Let's Get It On" and "Thinking Out Loud," Frank argued.

"Doesn't that suggest that 'Let's Get It On' is rather novel, or unique?" and doesn't that bolster the plagiarism case, the Townsend lawyer asked Sheeran's musicologist.

The musicologist fought back hard against the word "obscure." 

Georgy Girl "has been on more than one '101 Strings' albums," he protested, an almost comic anger rising in his voice.

"It's still available on two different albums" by the orchestra, he insisted. "You can call it obscure, but it is not." 

Ultimately, though, one can't legally plagiarize something that is not itself original, so "It doesn't matter," Sheeran's expert said, finally letting go of the question of "Georgy Girl's" obscurity in any of its versions. 

"What matters," he said — using an acronym for "Let's Get It On" — "is that 'LGO' did not do it first."

Townsend's side is seeking unspecified monetary damages from Sheeran, and to bar him from performing or recording "Thinking Out Loud" ever again.