Partner James Janowitz, a co-chair of Pryor Cashman's Media
+ Entertainment group and a senior partner in the Litigation Group,
discussed the influx of musical copyright cases seen in recent
years. According to The Economist:
Despite the rash of legal cases, music is evolving in ways that
may make it harder for complaints to succeed. "These days
music is less and less about melody...[which was] traditionally the
bedrock of why two songs were judged to be impermissibly
similar," says James Janowitz, a lawyer at Pryor Cashman, who
in 1976 organised a courtroom piano rendition to show that George
Harrison had copied "My Sweet Lord" from another work.
Today, he says, melody takes a back seat to elements such as beat
and subject matter, which are harder to claim as original.
