Mariah Carey Wins A Legal Battle Over Her Famous Anthem

Mariah Carey prevailed in a lawsuit alleging copyright infringement over her well-known Christmas song, “All I Want For Christmas Is You.” The song was added to the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry in 2023.

Judges ended a legal struggle against musician Adam Stone on Wednesday, March 19. Stone argued that Carey’s 1994 release of the song, which was written by him under the stage name Vince Vance and the Valiants, was a copy of his 1989 song of the same name.

The song was released five years before Carey’s best-selling Christmas anthem, and Stone said that Carey “exploited his popularity and flair” through it.

Stone claimed that Carey’s actions had exploited “his popularity and style” for commercial exploitation and demanded damages of at least $20 million USD. Judge Mónica Ramírez Almadani, however, dismissed the lawsuit because it was not possible to demonstrate that the parts in the songs were comparable.

Although the judge acknowledged that both used “Christmas song clichés,” she decided that this did not prove copyright infringement. Stone and his attorneys were also sanctioned by the court for engaging in “frivolous” arguments. The court subsequently mandated that they also cover Carey’s legal costs.

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Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ has taken on a life of modern cultural phenomenon since it was initially released, earning its writers around 8.5 million USD a year, as per Deadline. It has spent 140 weeks on the UK’s top 100 music chart and has made nearly 100 million USD in revenues.

In her memoir published in 2020, Carey wrote that she composed much of the song on a cheap little Casio keyboard, inspired by the movie It’s a Wonderful Life. She finished it in the studio with co-writer Walter Afanasieff. Now, it stands even more firmly as one of the most-loved songs of Christmas in all time.