Mintball wrote:To borrow from Wikipedia:

"Lloyd Webber has been accused of plagiarism in his works. His biographer, John Snelson, has acknowledged the strong similarity between the opening melody of the slow movement of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto and the Jesus Christ Superstar song "I Don't Know How to Love Him", but opines that Webber: "...brings a new dramatic tension to Mendelssohn's original melody through the confused emotions of Mary Magdalene. The opening theme may be Mendelssohn, but the rhythmic and harmonic treatment along with new lines of highly effective melodic development are Lloyd Webber's. The song works in its own right as its many performers and audiences can witness."[20]

In interviews promoting Amused to Death, Roger Waters, formerly of Pink Floyd, claimed that Lloyd Webber had plagiarised short chromatic riffs from the 1971 song "Echoes" for sections of The Phantom of the Opera, released in 1986; nevertheless, he decided not to file a lawsuit regarding the matter.

The songwriter Ray Repp made a similar claim about the same song, but insisted that Lloyd Webber stole the idea from him. Unlike Roger Waters, Ray Repp did decide to file a lawsuit, but the court eventually ruled in Lloyd Webber's favour.

Rick Wakeman, on his Grumpy Old Rockstar tour of 2008, accused Lloyd Webber of borrowing the main riff for the Phantom of the Opera tune from a section of his 1977 work "Judas Iscariot" from the album Criminal Record.

Lloyd Webber has also been accused of plagiarising Puccini, most notably in Requiem and The Phantom of the Opera. In the Program Guide for the San Francisco Opera's performance (2009–2010 season) of Puccini's Girl of the Golden West, on page 42, it states: "The climactic phrase in Dick Johnson'a aria, "Quello che taceta," bears a strong resemblance to a similar phrase in the Phantom's song, "Music of the Night," in Lloyd Webber's 1986 musical The Phantom of the Opera.

Following the musical's success, the Puccini estate filed suit against Lloyd Webber accusing him of plagiarism and the suit was settled out of court.

Lloyd Webber has also been accused of plagiarism by Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, who described him as "yet to think up a single note; in fact, the poor guy's never invented one note by himself."

DHM wrote:The only comment I have about Webber is that when I was 11 'ish we did a production of Jesus Christ Superstar at my school (not long after it was written I guess). Our school couldn't afford to pay the large chunk of cash required to be allowed to perform all the music so we had to read out 70% of the musical and act it without music. We were only allowed to perform the clearly defined "songs" with the music. It was excrutiating.
Money raised went to the school fund, Webber's production company made no exceptions. The Lord was getting his cut.

Stand-Offish wrote:Yes, I realised that he was accused of plagiarism and I wouldn't know if he deliberately copied extracts of previous works or not.

I would say that most musical style is derivative.
Musicians are a product in the main of the accumulated wealth of their experience with others people's music.
Just as you are the product of your accumulated experiences, granted not in music especially, but to some degree.
So just who is original?

It is also possible to reproduce music based on something you have heard before quite accidentally with no intention to plagiarise.
Obviously, if this is happening often, you have to wonder about the integrity of the composer.

Sometimes it is quite deliberate that one might chose a piece of music as the basis to compose another of your own. I don't think that is uncommon or for that matter necessarily plagiarism. You might use the structure as a base.

Is it the question of his originality then that makes you doubt his worth?

McLaren_Field wrote:Reminds me of Robert Palmers legal defence to charges that he had plagiarised "Some Guys Have All The Luck", not just the tune but the title too, he surmised that he must have heard the original tune when walking past an open window somewhere

Paul McCartney too is said to have played the tune "Yesterday" to several people before recording it as he had woken up one morning with the tune in his head and was convinced that it wasn't his tune but one that he must have overheard.

McLaren_Field wrote:pick Sinatra/Nelson Riddle's version.

Ferocious Aardvark wrote:I am not happy with the way music copyright is defended, usually by people who are not the composer or artists but just "own the rights". One good example was The Verve having to give up every penny from the superb Bittersweet Symphony, which is now perversely credited to Jagger and Richards. (And I'm sure The Verve would have won that one if they'd had the cash to fight it to a hearing).

Chris28 wrote:That peed me off too. I know there's defending your work etc, but it's not as if the Stones need the money. (Or maybe they do - I've lost count of the number of final tours/gigs they've done)