“My Sweet Lord” transformed George Harrison from the quiet Beatle into a solo superstar, but his greatest early solo hit soon became the center of an extraordinary copyright battle. The publishers of The Chiffons’ “He’s So Fine” accused Harrison of copying its melody. A judge ultimately ruled that Harrison had infringed the earlier song even though he had not done so deliberately, creating the famous idea of “subconscious plagiarism.” What followed was a legal fight involving millions of dollars, former Beatles manager Allen Klein and a case that lasted for years.
“My Sweet Lord” Was the Song That Proved George Harrison Had Never Needed to Hide Behind Lennon and McCartney
When The Beatles broke apart in 1970, one question hovered over George Harrison.
What would happen when the band's supposedly “third” songwriter finally stood alone?
George answered with All Things Must Pass.
And at the center of its enormous success was “My Sweet Lord.”
The song was spiritual without being confined to one religious vocabulary.
George blended “Hallelujah” with “Hare Krishna,” gradually moving between traditions as though he wanted listeners to recognize that devotion could transcend labels.
The song became enormously successful.
For George, it represented something bigger than finally proving he could produce a major hit without Lennon and McCartney.
It represented what he had been searching for spiritually.
Then came the accusation.
Listeners noticed that part of “My Sweet Lord” sounded remarkably similar to an earlier American hit:
“He's So Fine” by The Chiffons.
That song had been written by Ronald Mack and became a No. 1 U.S. hit in 1963.
George knew the song.
The question was whether he had copied it.
And in February 1971, Bright Tunes Music Corporation, which controlled the copyright, sued.
Suddenly George's spiritual anthem was heading toward a courtroom.
The Judge Reached a Remarkable Conclusion: George Copied It Without Knowing He Was Copying It
The case eventually went to trial in 1976.
The musical similarities were examined in detail.
The court compared recurring melodic patterns in “He's So Fine” with those appearing in “My Sweet Lord.”
George explained how his song had developed.
He had been playing chords while working with Billy Preston, experimenting with “Hallelujah” and “Hare Krishna,” before the song gradually took shape.
The judge did not conclude that George had deliberately sat down with “He's So Fine” and decided to steal it.
In fact, the decision explicitly stated that Harrison had not consciously used the earlier song.
Instead, Judge Richard Owen reached one of the most famous conclusions in music copyright history.
George's subconscious had remembered it.
The court reasoned that Harrison had previously heard “He's So Fine,” that the musical material remained somewhere in his memory, and that when he later composed “My Sweet Lord,” those patterns resurfaced without deliberate copying.
Legally, however, lack of intention did not eliminate infringement.
The judge therefore found Harrison liable for copyright infringement.
The phrase associated with the case became unforgettable:
subconscious plagiarism.
Imagine how strange that must have felt for a songwriter.
George was effectively being told:
You copied this song, but you may not have known you were doing it.
For any composer, that conclusion could create a terrifying question.
If music heard years earlier could remain hidden somewhere inside the mind, how could a songwriter ever be completely certain that a new melody was truly new?
George later acknowledged how damaging the experience was to his confidence as a songwriter.
What began as a hit had become something far more psychologically complicated.
And the legal battle was nowhere near finished.
The Fight Was No Longer Just About a Melody. It Became a Fight Over an Enormous Amount of Money
“My Sweet Lord” had earned a great deal of money.
That meant determining infringement was only the beginning.
The courts next had to determine how much of the song's success resulted from the melody found to infringe “He's So Fine.”
A 1981 decision calculated that approximately $1.6 million of “My Sweet Lord” earnings were attributable to the music derived from “He's So Fine.”
But the judge also recognized something obvious.
People had not bought “My Sweet Lord” simply because of its melody.
They bought it because it was George Harrison.
The lyrics mattered.
George's voice mattered.
His fame mattered.
The spiritual atmosphere mattered.
His status as a former Beatle mattered.
The court attributed part of the song's commercial success to those other factors as well.
Still, George was facing enormous financial consequences.
His biggest early solo triumph had become attached to one of rock music's most famous plagiarism judgments.
Then the story became even stranger.
Because Allen Klein entered the picture.
George’s Former Manager Ended Up Buying the Copyright at the Center of the Lawsuit
Allen Klein had once handled George Harrison's business affairs.
That relationship mattered enormously.
Klein had inside knowledge concerning Harrison's interests during the early stages of the copyright dispute.
After Klein and The Beatles fell out, their relationship deteriorated into bitter litigation.
Then something extraordinary happened.
Bright Tunes sold the copyright to “He's So Fine,” along with its interests in the lawsuit.
The buyer was ABKCO, Klein's company.
The purchase price was $587,000.
Think about the situation.
The man who had previously acted as George's business manager was now connected to the company owning the song George had been found to infringe.
Later court proceedings took this conflict extremely seriously.
An appellate decision described how Klein, without Harrison's knowledge, had offered significantly more for Bright Tunes than Harrison's side had offered in settlement negotiations. The court viewed Klein's inside knowledge and conduct as crucial to understanding the subsequent litigation.
The case therefore stopped being merely:
Did George Harrison copy a melody?
It became a story about business relationships, confidential knowledge, loyalty and what can happen when former allies become opponents.
And incredibly, the litigation kept going.
The Lawsuit Followed George for Years, but “My Sweet Lord” Survived It
The original copyright action began in 1971.
The infringement ruling came in 1976.
But disputes surrounding damages and ownership continued through multiple court proceedings for years afterward. A 1991 appellate decision noted that the litigation had already lasted more than fifteen years.
George had written a song about wanting to know God.
Instead, he spent years discussing its melody with lawyers.
There is a cruel irony in that.
“My Sweet Lord” came from one of the most personal parts of George Harrison's identity.
His spiritual search was not an image created by a record company.
India had changed him.
Ravi Shankar had influenced him deeply.
Meditation and Hindu philosophy had become central to the way George understood life.
He wanted the song to express longing for something beyond material existence.
Yet one of his most heartfelt compositions became associated with contracts, copyright percentages, damages and courtrooms.
George even responded to the controversy through music.
His 1976 song “This Song” humorously addressed the absurdities of the plagiarism case.
That response says something wonderful about him.
He could be wounded by the experience.
But he could also laugh at it.
And ultimately, the lawsuit did not destroy “My Sweet Lord.”
More than half a century after its release, listeners still hear the song.
Many know nothing about Bright Tunes.
Many have never heard “He's So Fine.”
Many do not know the name of the judge who decided the case.
They simply hear George.
A slide guitar.
A melody.
“Hallelujah.”
“Hare Krishna.”
And a man asking to become closer to God.
That may be the most extraordinary ending of all.
George technically lost the infringement case.
The court concluded that his subconscious had borrowed from something he had heard years earlier.
But he never really lost “My Sweet Lord.”
The song remained attached to him.
It remained part of All Things Must Pass.
It remained one of the recordings most closely associated with his solo career.
And perhaps the controversy inadvertently made the song's story even more fascinating.
Because behind one of George Harrison's most beautiful spiritual songs lies one of music history's strangest legal questions:
Can someone copy a song without realizing they are copying it?
For George Harrison, a federal court's answer was:
Yes.
And that answer changed music copyright history forever.
