The UK judicial system is not the place to settle a copyright dispute between the estates of Jimi Hendrix’s former bandmates Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell, and Sony Music Entertainment UK, the High Court has heard.
Sony, represented by Robert Howe KC, made an application to challenge the jurisdiction of the copyright claim and stay the case until proceedings in New York proceedings are concluded.
The court heard Redding and Mitchell had signed the rights to recordings away in ‘wide-ranging and comprehensive’ releases.
Redding, who died in 2003, received a ‘substantial payment of $100,000 while Mitchell, who died in 2008, received $247,500. The figures are the equivalent of approximately $589,000 and $1,457,775 today, according to Sony.
The day-long hearing at the Rolls Building this week follows a legal battle in New York where Sony is seeking court confirmation that the agreements signed in the early 1970s are still in force.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience was formed in London in 1966 and inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. The band, made up of guitarist Jimi Hendrix, Redding on bass and drummer Mitchell, had three UK top ten hits and their last performance together as the original line up was in 1969. Hendrix died of a drug overdose in 1970.
Noel Redding Estate and Mitch Mitchell Estate claim they are the joint owners of the copyright of albums of studio sound recordings made of the Jimi Hendrix Experience and are owed unpaid royalties.
Howe said: ‘The true nature of the dispute which the claimant will have to plead and prove here is whether they have any relevant rights at all, and whether they have any relevant rights at all will depend on whether the estate has any rights to give them.’
Howe told the court that would be proven by the releases in the US courts. He added: ‘If the New York court decided questions of releases against the claimants that will be the end of this case because they will have no basis.
‘If the English court reaches a different view on the scope of the releases to the New York court, we then have directly conflicting judgments. If I am wrong on jurisdiction, it would be convenient to stay English proceedings just until the New York proceedings are determined.’
Simon Malynicz KC, for Redding and Mitchell, told the court the releases did not give the musicians’ rights away and only related to revenue generated by the vinyl recordings,which does not include digital income including from streaming, YouTube and other digital platforms.
Malynicz said: ‘We say if you’re identifying what the case is, the issue to be tried, and see the releases as an ownership dispute or the right to exploit, we say that is not at all what the releases are.
‘As far as we can see, it is only clause 2 that relates to performance of likeness and sound and that is specific…in relation to imagery of performance, not all performance rights, recording rights and so on. We do not need to do better than saying there is argument in that. What the releases are really about is giving consent for the distribution of recordings – vinyl recordings.’
Judgment was reserved.
