Grand Upright Music, Ltd. v. Warner Bros. Records Inc.

Grand Upright Music, Ltd v. Warner Bros. Records Inc.
Court	United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
Full case name	Grand Upright Music Limited v. Warner Bros. Records Inc., WEA International Inc., Marcel Hall, professionally known as Biz Markie, Biz Markie Productions Inc., Cool V Productions Inc., Cold Chillin' Records Inc., Biz Markie Music Inc., Cold Chillin' Music Publishing Inc., Tyrone Williams, and Benny Medina
Decided	December 17, 1991
Citation(s)	780 F. Supp. 182, 1992 Copr.L.Dec. (CCH) ¶ 26,878, 22 U.S.P.Q.2d 1556, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18276
Holding
That the Defendants had tried to secure a license from plaintiff prior to sampling its copyrighted song helped establish that their copyright infringement was knowing and intentional and that plaintiff was the valid copyright holder. Preliminary injunction granted.
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Kevin Thomas Duffy
Laws applied
Copyright Act of 1976 (not cited)

Grand Upright Music, Ltd v. Warner Bros. Records Inc., 780 F. Supp. 182 (S.D.N.Y. 1991), was a copyright case heard by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Songwriter Gilbert O'Sullivan sued rapper Biz Markie after Markie sampled O'Sullivan's song "Alone Again (Naturally)". The court ruled that sampling without permission constitutes copyright infringement. The judgment changed the hip hop music industry, requiring that any future music sampling be approved by the original copyright owners.^[1]