American singer Mariah Carey’s timeless hit song “All I Want For Christmas Is You” was not stolen from other songwriters, according to a federal judge in Los Angeles.
In granting Carey’s plea for summary judgment on Wednesday, Judge Mónica Ramírez Almadani gave her and co-writer and co-defendant Walter Afanasieff a victory without a trial.
Songwriters Troy Powers of Tennessee and Andy Stone of Louisiana, who perform under the stage name Vince Vance, filed a $20 million lawsuit in 2023, claiming that Carey’s 1994 song, which has since become a holiday standard and yearly streaming sensation, violated the copyright of their country’s 1989 song of the same name.
Their attorney, Gerard P. Fox, emailed The Associated Press to express his disappointment.
According to Fox, judges at this stage “almost always now dismiss a music copyright case, and that one must appeal to reverse and get the case to the jury.
“My client will decide soon whether or not to file an appeal. Based on the views of two renowned musicologists who are professors at prestigious universities, we filed.”
According to Stone and Powers’ lawsuit, “All I Want For Christmas Is You” has a unique linguistic structure. In it, a person writes a letter to Santa Claus because they want to be with their loved one after being disillusioned with pricey presents and seasonal luxuries.
They said there was a “strong probability” that Carey and Afanasieff had heard their song, which peaked at number 31 on Billboard’s Hot Country chart at one point and had violated their copyright by stealing key parts of it.
Following the testimony of two experts from each side, Ramírez Almadani concurred with the defence’s assertion that Carey’s song diverged from the writers’ use of typical Christmas tropes that existed before both songs. She said the plaintiffs had failed to prove that the songs were significantly similar.
The plaintiffs and their attorneys were also sanctioned by Ramírez Almadani, who declared that the suit and subsequent filings were frivolous and that the attorneys “made no reasonable effort to ensure that the factual contentions asserted have evidentiary support.”
They have to cover at least a portion of the defendant’s legal costs, she said.
A request for comment from Carey’s publicists and defence lawyers was not immediately answered.
More people have been enjoying Carey’s Christmas extravaganza in recent years than they were in the 1990s. Billboard’s Hot 100 chart, which ranks the most popular songs every week—not only those with holiday themes—by airplay, sales, and streaming, puts it at the top for the last six years in a row.
The dispute between Carey and Afanasieff over who wrote how much of the song has been public, but it hasn’t gone to court. But they became at least short-term allies because of the case.
