British star Ed Sheeran is facing accusations that he plagiarized Marvin Gaye's hit song, "Let's Get It On." Cheddar News breaks down how the high-profile copyright trial came to fruition and gets expert guidance from Joe Bennett, a forensic musicologist.

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Today Explained: Did Ed Sheeran Copy Marvin Gaye?

And you've probably been hearing Ed Sheeran's name a lot in the headlines. He's facing a lawsuit claiming he copied a Marvin Gaye hit but not everything may be so straightforward. The singer was back in court today in New York as the trial continues our own. Duarte Jain dug deeper to find out why these cases keep popping up. Hey Michelle Ed, she is being accused of copying from Marvin Gaye. His accusers are arguing the song thinking out loud is suspiciously similar to let's get it on and to make these songs easier to compare here, they are in the same tempo and key. Well, you 2 70 at first listen, you might have noticed some similarities but Joe Bennett, he's not convinced he's a forensic musicologist and frequently consults in cases of copyright infringement. It subjectively does sound similar. But what the defendants are arguing at Sheeran's side is that this is a common place, set of chords that appears in lots of songs, including many songs that predate. Let's get it on with only so many notes in music. There are only so many ways you can combine chords. Bennett played cheddar multiple songs. He says use the same chords that are featured in both Sheeran's and Gays song, including one from The Beatles that was released before let's get it on even came out. The other important thing to remember is that these lawsuits are pretty common. The first such case dates back to 18 44. I think what a lot of people aren't aware of is that short melodic coincidences happen all the time in music. It's just the nature of the use of scales and melodies that you, you will get occasional partial matches. It's not evidence of anything. It's just a coincidence and those coincidences are more common than people think some of your favorite artists. They probably faced similar lawsuits. Everyone from George Harrison to led Zeppelin to Taylor Swift. This isn't even the first lawsuit against Ed Sheeran. So what's Bennett's opinion about this case? This is not plagiarism. This is a simple coincidence, two songwriters decades apart using a simple, slightly similar sounding well loved chord sequence. Bennet's an expert and he admits jurors who hear these cases, they don't often have the training to decipher subtle differences. So these cases end up being more about hearing commonalities than knowing how common these occurrences actually are. So the next time that you hear about one of these cases, remember, there's so much more to music than just what you hear