Music sampling lawsuits are moving at a pace the industry has not seen in years, with a Los Angeles jury finding Ye liable in May 2026 for an unauthorized sample, Miley Cyrus fighting a federal case over “Flowers,” and record labels suing the AI companies Suno, Udio, and Anthropic over whether training a model on copyrighted recordings is itself a form of infringement.1The New York Times. Kanye West Copyright Sample Verdict The legal rules vary sharply depending on where a case is filed, and the financial consequences of getting it wrong can reach seven figures.
The Ye Verdict and What It Awarded
In May 2026, a Los Angeles jury found Ye personally liable for $176,153 and his companies Yeezy LLC, Yeezy Supply, and Mascotte Holdings liable for roughly $260,000 more over the use of a track called “MSD PT2” in early versions of “Moon” and “Hurricane” played at a July 2021 listening event in Atlanta promoting Donda. The original musicians, Sam Barsh, Dan Seeff, Josh Mease, and Khalil Abdul-Rahman, had assigned their rights to a firm called Artist Revenue Advocates. A judge had already dismissed claims related to the final album version of “Hurricane,” ruling the plaintiffs had previously signed away those royalty rights, and Artist Revenue Advocates has said it will appeal to the Ninth Circuit.2Rolling Stone. Kanye Found Liable in Hurricane Copyright Infringement Trial
Ye has been involved in at least 17 identified sampling lawsuits. Several were settled confidentially, one was dismissed as too minor, and at least five remain pending as of mid-2026, including a 2025 case over “Gun to My Head” and a February 2026 case over “530.”3Billboard. Kanye West Ye Sampling Lawsuits Full List In 2024, he settled with the estate of Donna Summer over an unauthorized interpolation of “I Feel Love” and faced public allegations from Ozzy Osbourne over a sample of Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man.”1The New York Times. Kanye West Copyright Sample Verdict
Other Major Sampling Cases Working Through the Courts
The Ye verdict is one of several active sampling disputes involving top-tier artists.
- Miley Cyrus is defending Flowers against Tempo Music Investments, which acquired a share of the copyright to Bruno Mars’s “When I Was Your Man” and alleges Cyrus duplicated melodic, harmonic, and lyrical elements. A federal judge denied her motion to dismiss in March 2025.4Fox Business. Judge Denies Miley Cyrus Attempt to Dismiss Flowers Lawsuit
- Sam Smith and Normani’s 2018 song “Dancing With a Stranger” is back in litigation after the Ninth Circuit revived a lawsuit in April 2025 from songwriters Jordan Vincent, Christopher Miranda, and Rosco Banlaoi over a 2015 track of the same name. The appeals court said the plaintiffs’ theory about how individually unprotectable elements were combined deserved a jury’s consideration.5Rolling Stone. Sam Smith Normani Dancing With a Stranger Lawsuit Revived
- Rauw Alejandro was sued by BM Records in August 2025 over four tracks on Saturno alleged to contain uncleared samples from reggaeton pioneer DJ Playero, with the plaintiff seeking up to $150,000 per song. The artist has said he believed his previous label had properly cleared the samples.6Rolling Stone. Rauw Alejandro Sued Over DJ Playero Samples on Saturno
- Bad Bunny won dismissal in March 2026 of a suit alleging that “Enséñame a Bailar” sampled the 2019 track “Empty My Pocket,” after the plaintiffs missed court deadlines and their attorneys withdrew. He is now seeking over $465,000 in legal fees from the plaintiff’s record label, emPawa Africa.7Billboard. Bad Bunny Wins Lawsuit Over Uncleared Sample on Un Verano Sin Ti
- Drake was sued for $10 million in 2023 by Ghanaian artist Obrafour, who alleged “Calling My Name” sampled his 2003 single “Oye Ohene (Remix)” without permission. According to the complaint, a member of Drake’s team sent clearance emails the week before the album dropped, but the album was released before Obrafour responded.8Rolling Stone. Drake Copyright Infringement Lawsuit Over Calling My Name Sample
- Travis Scott, SZA, and Future were sued in January 2025 by singer Victory Boyd, who alleged “Telekinesis” infringed her 2019 track “Like the Way It Sounds.” The case survived an early motion to dismiss but was later dropped by the plaintiff.9Rolling Stone. Travis Scott SZA Future Telekinesis Copyright Infringement Lawsuit10Music Business Worldwide. Travis Scott SZA Future Sued for Alleged Copyright Infringement Over Telekinesis
AI Music Training as the New Battleground
Record labels and music publishers are testing whether training an AI model on copyrighted recordings is itself a form of unauthorized sampling. Two of the biggest disputes have already settled. Warner Music Group reached a deal with Suno in November 2025 that included a reported multi-million-dollar payment and a licensing partnership, and Universal Music Group settled with Udio in October 2025, announcing plans for a jointly operated “walled-garden” AI music platform where outputs cannot be freely downloaded or posted externally.11Billboard. Biggest Music Law Stories 2025 Sony Music remains the only major label still actively litigating against both companies, with rulings on fair-use arguments expected in the summer of 2026.12Chartlex. Music Industry AI Lawsuits Tracker 2026
A separate case targets Anthropic, the company behind the chatbot Claude. Universal Music Group, Concord, and ABKCO allege the company trained its model by scraping copyrighted song lyrics from pirate libraries, covering at least 500 songs by artists including Beyoncé and the Rolling Stones. The publishers have asked the court to reject Anthropic’s fair-use defense before trial. The case is complicated by a July 2025 ruling in a separate Anthropic lawsuit involving books, where a different judge found that using copyrighted material for AI training was “quintessentially transformative.” The music publishers are trying to distinguish their claims by pointing to what they call overwhelming evidence that the chatbot reproduces lyrics on demand.13Reuters. US Music Publishers Suing Anthropic Make Their Case Against AI Fair Use
The Law Depends on Where the Case Is Filed
Whether a tiny sample is actionable at all turns on which federal circuit hears the case, and the law has been split for a decade.
In the Sixth Circuit (covering states including Tennessee and Michigan), Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Dimension Films controls. The Sixth Circuit held in 2005 that any unauthorized digital sampling of a copyrighted sound recording is infringement, no matter how small. The court rejected any inquiry into whether the copied portion was too minor to matter, declaring: “Get a license or do not sample.” The court grounded its rule in the Copyright Act’s treatment of sound recordings as physical fixed works, reasoning that the copyright owner holds the exclusive right to sample their own recording.14Justia. Bridgeport Music v. Dimension Films, 410 F.3d 792
In the Ninth Circuit (covering California and much of the West Coast, where most of the industry sits), VMG Salsoul, LLC v. Ciccone runs the other way. The 2016 case involved a 0.23-second horn hit from “Love Break” alleged to appear in Madonna’s “Vogue.” The Ninth Circuit held that the de minimis exception, which excuses trivially small copying, applies to sound recordings just as it does to everything else. If an average listener would not recognize the borrowed material, the use is too minor to be actionable. The court called the Bridgeport reasoning “unpersuasive.”15US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. VMG Salsoul LLC v. Ciccone, 824 F.3d 871 The Supreme Court has not resolved the split.16Washington University Law Review. De Minimis Exception in Digital Music Sampling
Infringement claims have also expanded beyond literal sampling. The 2015 “Blurred Lines” verdict found that Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams’s song infringed Marvin Gaye’s 1977 “Got to Give It Up” despite no shared melody, chord progression, or lyrics. The jury relied on the songs’ similar “feel” and “groove” and awarded the Gaye estate $7.4 million, then the largest amount ever in a music copyright case.17Ethics Unwrapped, UT Austin. Blurred Lines Copyright The Ninth Circuit affirmed in a 2-1 decision in 2018; dissenting Judge Jacqueline Nguyen warned that the ruling effectively allowed a musical “style” to be copyrighted and would shrink the pool of ideas available to future songwriters.18Harvard Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law. Williams v. Gaye, 885 F.3d 1150 A plaintiff no longer needs to show a direct melodic or rhythmic copy to bring a serious claim.
The Defenses, and Why They Rarely Save an Artist
Two legal defenses dominate sampling cases: that the borrowed material was too small to count (de minimis) and that the new use was fair use.
The de minimis defense works only in friendly circuits. The strongest precedent is Newton v. Diamond (2003), in which the Beastie Boys had licensed the sound recording of jazz flutist James Newton’s “Choir” for $1,000 but never licensed the underlying composition. The Ninth Circuit held that the six-second, three-note segment was so insignificant to the composition that an average listener would not recognize it, and dismissed the claim.19GW Law MCIR. Newton v. Diamond That rule has no force in the Sixth Circuit, where Bridgeport rejects it outright.
Fair use is harder still. Courts weigh four factors: whether the new use is transformative, the creative nature of the original, how much was taken, and whether the sample competes with the original in the marketplace.20US Copyright Office. Estate of James Oscar Smith v. Cash Money Records The first successful non-parody fair use ruling in a sampling case came in 2017, when a federal judge in New York found that Drake’s use of a 35-second spoken-word clip from jazz musician Jimmy Smith on “Pound Cake” was transformative. Where Smith’s original celebrated jazz as the only “real music,” Drake repurposed the words to celebrate authenticity across all genres. The Second Circuit affirmed in 2020.21Shapiro Arato Bach. Shapiro Arato Bach Prevails in Second Circuit Against Suit Claiming Drake Improperly Sampled Work of Jazz Artist Jimmy Smith It remains an exception. Music’s creative nature cuts against fair use almost by default, and commercial releases carry an additional disadvantage.
What Clearance Costs, and What Skipping It Costs
Clearing a sample requires written permission from two separate rights holders: the owner of the master recording, usually a label or performing artist, and the owner of the underlying composition, usually a songwriter or publisher. Re-recording a melody note-for-note (an interpolation) still requires the composition license but skips the master.22Spotify for Artists. The Dos and Donts of Sample Clearances
There is no set price. For lesser-known recordings, total clearance fees run from $1,000 to $8,000. Mid-level catalog material typically costs $3,500 to $25,000, and samples of major hits can exceed $75,000.23Chartlex. Sample Clearance Guide for Musicians 2026 Original rights holders commonly require a share of the new song’s royalties, with publishing splits ranging from 15% to 50%, and the original publisher may demand co-ownership of the new composition. The process usually takes two to six months, and permissions are often narrowly scoped: a clearance for an album release may not cover use in a film, commercial, or compilation.22Spotify for Artists. The Dos and Donts of Sample Clearances
Skipping clearance is more expensive. Statutory damages under the Copyright Act range from $750 to $30,000 per infringement, and willful violations can reach $150,000 per work. Courts can also award actual damages plus the infringer’s profits, and successful plaintiffs can recover attorney’s fees.23Chartlex. Sample Clearance Guide for Musicians 2026 Streaming platforms can remove infringing tracks, and rights holders can claim 100% of a song’s revenue. Vanilla Ice paid $4 million to buy the publishing rights to Queen and David Bowie’s “Under Pressure” after a 1990 threat of suit over the bassline in “Ice Ice Baby,” and the private settlement also gave Queen and Bowie songwriting credits.24GW Law MCIR. Queen David Bowie v. Vanilla Ice Nicki Minaj paid Tracy Chapman $450,000 to settle a claim over the song “Sorry.” Even winning in court is expensive, as Bad Bunny’s $465,000 fee demand shows.25Rolling Stone Canada. Bad Bunny Copyright Case Legal Bill Reimbursement
Years do not reduce the risk. Moby was sued in 2014 over samples allegedly taken from the First Choice song “Let No Man Put Asunder” on his 1992 debut album, more than two decades after release.26The Hollywood Reporter. Moby Sued Over 22-Year-Old Samples Once a song goes out without clearance, the leverage sits with the rights holder.