Rain Perry
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thread 1/14
DEBUT THREAD in honor of Ed Sheeran prevailing in his lawsuit today. Let me explain why it matters!
07:11 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 2/14
Music law is confusing! Let me clear up a few things and tell you about the “sensitive female chord progression.”
07:14 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 3/14
1. Ed Sheeran is not being sued for sampling - ie using a snippet of the recording of - Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On.”
2. (Sampling is legal, but you have to pay what’s called a “mechanical royalty“ in order to do it.)
07:15 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 4/14
2a. You also have to give a songwriting credit if you sample someone else’s song, which is a major reason why songs seem to have so many songwriters these days.
3. Ed Sheeran is being sued because his song is “similar“ to “Let’s Get It On” - in other words uses the same or a similar chord pattern.
07:15 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 5/14
Artists are worried about this because there are thousands of songs with the same or similar chord patterns. It’s just how music works. It’s one thing to lift a melody directly from another song but that’s not what this suit alleges.
07:15 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 6/14
To understand this better, think of the Sensitive Female Chord Progression, so named because it was used in a bunch of female rock songs in the 90s. You don’t have to know it’s vi-IV-I-V to know that you’ve heard it a million times, from Beyoncé’s “If I Were a Boy”
07:16 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 7/14
to Bon Jovi’s “It’s My Life.” Basically, if you can sing “what if God was one of us/just a slob like one of us” over it, that’s the one.
07:16 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 8/14
That’s OK! There are tried and true chord progressions in popular music. They serve a certain emotional purpose. Marvin Gaye was not the first songwriter to use the progression in “let’s get it on“ but he might be the most famous.
07:16 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 9/14
I teach my songwriting classes how to write a blues song because that simple I-IV-V structure is a doorway to the expression of deep emotion, but also to comedy. It’s a versatile tool.
07:17 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 10/14
All music is derivative - ie builds on what came before. Some artists do it poorly and create what I might call “derivative crap,” and some artists do it with such grace that they incorporate and pay tribute to the influence, while the new song elevates it into a brand new thing.
07:17 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 11/14
Here’s the article that described the sensitive female chord progression. http://archive.boston.com/...
07:18 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 12/14
Here’s the pertinent passage:

“Songwriters reuse certain chord progressions all the time, from the 12-bar blues to the doo-woppish I-vi-IV-V (forever familiar to novice piano players as "Heart and Soul") that helped dominate the 1950s with songs like "Earth Angel" and "Donna."
07:19 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 13/14
So just because the Sensitive Female Chord Progression had a banner year doesn't mean songwriters are running out of ideas - only that when Beyoncé wanted to tug at the heartstrings, she knew exactly which tool to use.”
07:19 PM - May 04, 2023
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Rain Perry
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thread 14/14
Here’s hoping the Sheeran jury gets it right.

UPDATE: they did!!!!
07:20 PM - May 04, 2023
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Kristine G
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In response to Rain Perry.
TIL about female chord progression! Excellent thread!
01:58 PM - May 05, 2023
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Mustang Sally
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In response to Rain Perry.
Great explanation
07:23 PM - May 04, 2023
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