Sony Music won permission to appeal – and subsequently had its appeal dismissed –  in a case involving recording and performer rights relating to sixties rock giants The Jimi Hendrix Experience.

Sony Music Entertainment UK Limited v Noel Redding Estate Limited & Anor concerns three studio albums released before the death in 1970 of guitarist Jimi Hendrix.

Bass player Noel Redding died in 2003 and drummer Mitch Mitchell in 2008. The claimants, on behalf of the musicians’ estates, argue they now own a share of the sound recording copyrights and performers’ rights in relation to the albums Are You Experienced; Axis: Bold as Love; and Electric Ladyland.

Sony says the worldwide copyright of the relevant sound recordings is owned by two LLCs – Experience Hendrix LLC and Authentic Hendrix LLC – registered in Washington state. Sony made an application challenging jurisdiction, arguing the claim should be tried in New York.

Deputy Master Rhys dismissed the application to set aside or stay the action on the grounds that the dispute should be heard in New York. It was ‘obvious that England is the most natural and appropriate forum’.

Sony appealed.

The High Court had previously heard Redding and Mitchell signed away the rights to recordings in ‘wide-ranging and comprehensive’ releases.

In the 41-page judgment, Mr Justice Edwin Johnson ruled on the application for permission to appeal and the appeal itself. He said: ‘The appeal court should be slow to interfere unless the Deputy Master made a significant or material error of principle (such as taking into account irrelevant or mistaken material or omitting relevant material) or reached a decision that was plainly wrong.’

The judge said ‘more is required’ than ‘simple’ disagreement of another judge’s decision on the question of a stay on case management grounds’. It was necessary to show ‘something went wrong in the evaluative exercise’ which was ‘sufficiently fundamental…to justify interference’.

Johnson granted permission for the appeal before dismissing it.

He added: ‘It seems to me that the Deputy Master was entitled to rely on all but one of the factors on which he did rely, in carrying out the evaluative exercise which resulted in the Forum Decision’.  Sony had ‘failed to.. show that New York is the more appropriate forum for the case’.