Estates of Jimi Hendrix Experience members lose legal battle to Sony
The estates of Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell, members of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, have lost their High Court battle with Sony Music Entertainment UK.
The estates of the two late British musicians pursued legal action against Sony Music Entertainment UK in the High Court, alleging to have been consistently excluded from a share of revenue relating to recordings made by the Jimi Hendrix Experience between 1966 and 1968.
However, the claims have been dismissed in their entirety. Sony argued that they signed away any rights to performers’ rights in 1966 as part of an agreement that allowed them to release music “by any method now known or hereafter to be known”.
Judge Edwin Johnson ruled in Sony’s favour, highlighting that the agreement that Redding and Mitchell signed “was not limited to any particular methods for the delivery of music”, per Reuters.
In his 140-page written report, Johnson declared (via The Independent) that the deal was “clear and unequivocal” in stating that the copyright belonged to the producers rather than the performers.
He added, “The producers and the band members agreed that the producers would have the copyright throughout the world in the recordings … There was no temporal or territorial limitation to this agreement.”
Legal firm Blackstone Chambers, which defended Sony Music in the case, wrote in a press release celebrating their legal victory, “The claims failed on three independent grounds.”
It then laid out the three reasons for the ruling, “First, on the proper construction of the original 1966 Recording Agreement between the Band Members and their producers (Michael Jeffery and Chas Chandler), which the Judge held did not vest copyright ownership in Mr Redding and Mr Mitchell.”
Blackstone Chambers then noted that “the claims were precluded by Releases entered into by Mr Redding and Mr Mitchell during their lifetimes, construed in accordance with New York law”.
Lastly, they added, “Third, because the claims were further precluded by Discontinuances of earlier US proceedings involving the same subject matter.”
In December 2025, Simon Malynicz KC, who represented the estates of both the late bassist and drummer, told the court that the band, which was active from 1966 to 1970, “was one of the most commercially successful acts of its era”.
However, he went on to explain that, despite this, Redding and Mitchell “were excluded early on in their lifetimes” and “died in relative poverty”.
Mitchell died in 2008, while Redding passed away in 2003.
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