Shakira faces plagiarism lawsuit ‘Unwanted’ Russians could shun Eurovision in Ukraine
A Cuban singer and music producer has filed a plagiarism lawsuit against pop stars Shakira and Carlos Vives for allegedly copying his work in the Colombian duo’s award-winning hit La Bicicleta.
Livan Rafael Castellanos, also known as Livam, says he wants a court to decide whether parts of his 1997 song Yo te quiero tanto were plagiarised in the hit that won two of the three biggest Grammy Latino awards in 2016 – song and record of the year.
‘‘I have nothing against Shakira, Vives or anybody else,’’ Livam said. ‘‘It’s the law that needs to decide whether changing a song’s key is enough to make it different.’’
The lyrics in Livam’s original chorus are ‘‘I love you, I love you so much’’, while Vives and Shakira sing ‘‘I’m dreaming and I love you so much’’ with a rhythm and melody that Livam argues are similar. His complaint notes that both songs use accordions.
Livam, who works in Madrid as a composer and producer, said his 3 year-old daughter identified her father’s melody in La Bicicleta when the family heard the hit coming from a radio during a beach holiday last year.
The musician consulted musical experts and contacted the labels representing Vives, Shakira and Andres Eduardo Castro, a producer who appears registered as the author of La Bicicleta . No agreements were reached, according to Livam.
A judge in the Spanish capital this week accepted the lawsuit, filed by MDRB Music Publishing, the label holding the copyright for Livam’s work. He had given the plaintiffs 20 days to present further evidence, judicial authorities said.
SGAE, the main society managing the rights of authors and publishers in Spain, said it had suspended the rights of the song, following the association’s usual procedure when one of its members lodges a complaint.
A legal representative for Sony ATV Music Publishing in Spain, which represents Shakira and Castro, said yesterday the company could not comment because it had not received notice of the lawsuit.
La Bicicleta– which means ‘‘The Bike’’ in English– was also nominated last month by the Billboard Awards as best 2016 Hot Latin Song.
Livam said he was happy for the success of the hit no matter what the judge’s eventual ruling about whether his creation was part of the hit.
‘‘I’m just a musician, but I don’t want to be robbed,’’ he said. The annual festival of glitz and glamour that is the Eurovision Song Contest is facing its latest crisis, with Russian stars and politicians urging a boycott.
Critics in Moscow say their country should shun the competition on May 13 because it will be held in neighbouring Ukraine, where government troops are fighting pro-Russian separatists in the Donbas region.
Some of Russia’s most popular celebrities and prominent politicians have spoken out against participating, while the Kremlin said it was not yet convinced that the country should take part.
Vitaly Milonov, a prominent MP from the ruling United Russia party, called for a boycott in response to the Ukrainian government’s ‘‘Russophobic’’ policies, and because ‘‘the bloodshed of the civil war in Donbas is not subsiding’’.
Last year’s contest in Stockholm was won controversially by Jamala, a Ukrainian, with her song 1944, about the Soviet deportation of more than 200,000 Crimean Tatars to central Asia during World War II. It was viewed as a political jab in Moscow because Tatars in Crimea have complained of persecution since Russian President Vladimir Putin annexed the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014.
Milonov, who is known for his tirades against gays and the ‘‘depravity’’ of the West, said: ‘‘Our artists’ participation in this contest is unacceptable in any form. It is impossible to imagine that in 1943 Soviet citizens would have headed for a musical competition called Reichovision.’’
Russians would be guests in a state fanatics’’, he added.
Josef Kobzon, 79, a singer often described as Russia’s Frank Sinatra, supported the idea of a boycott. He said he was against performing in front of an audience that would ‘‘debase the dignity of my country and my colleagues’’.
‘‘We must categorically ignore the holding of the competition in a country which is destroying people in Donbas.’’
Nearly 10,000 people have died in eastern Ukraine since 2014. Russian troops have made incursions into eastern Ukraine in support ‘‘unwanted seized by of the separatists, Moscow denies this.
The Kremlin is in two minds about whether to support a Russian Eurovision entrant, who has yet to be chosen.
Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, said it was ‘‘not clear whether we need to boycott’’, adding: ‘‘Of course, considering where this competition is taking place, and the possible problems with security, there is an obvious cause for concern.’’
Olga Chervakova, a Ukrainian MP, said the doubting Russians were victims of Kremlin propaganda about Ukraine.
‘‘We call Russia an aggressor,’’ she said. ‘‘But we can separate the Russian authorities from ordinary Russian citizens. They have nothing to fear.’’ although