Private Law Theory

ABSTRACT
This Article examines the use of testimony from expert forensic musicologists in music copyright infringement cases. It concludes that courts presently misuse such testimony in ways that confuse juries and violate the Federal Rules of Evidence. This does not mean that forensic musicologists should not testify in music copyright cases. Musicologists have ample training and expertise to help juries identify formal similarities between musical works and understand whether those similarities suggest copying. However, opinions concluding that a defendant did or did not copy from the plaintiff’s work do not have sufficient reliability to be admissible under the Federal Rules of Evidence. Courts should therefore end the practice of admitting these opinions into evidence.

Yen, Alfred Chueh-Chin, The Evidentiary Use and Misuse of Forensic Musicology in Copyright Litigation (November 15, 2024).