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Robin Thicke performed a piano medley in court this week, in an effort to prove that his song 'Blurred Lines' is significantly different to Marvin Gaye's 'Got To Give It Up'.
The two year-long legal proceedings were actually instigated by Thicke himself, who preemptively sued the family of Marvin Gaye in 2013 after they accused him of copying the "feel and sound" of Gaye's 'Got To Give It Up' - a song Thicke had already cited as an influence on his controversial hit.
Listen to 'Got To Give It Up' below
...and listen to 'Blurred Lines' below
As Billboard reports, because Gaye's children only hold the copyrights to the sheet music, not the recordings themselves, Judge John Kronstadt has agreed that only the music as written was at issue, and only stripped-down versions of Gaye's compositions could be heard in court.
As such, Thicke brought his keyboard into the courtroom in an attempt to prove that the court progressions of his song were siginificantly different to Gaye's. He also treated the jury to a Medley of U2, The Beatles, Alphaville, Bob Marley and Michael Jackson, to demonstrate the frequency with which songs can share similar chords and melodies.
Janis Gaye, Marvin's former wife, told the court, "To my understanding, composition is part of the recording and there's nothing out there to compare to. That would be the only way we could have heard the composition. You can't hear a piece of paper. The ears tell the story."
The trial continues this week with testimony from musicologist Judith Finell.
