Pharrell Williams and Robin Thicke’s ‘Blurred Lines’ breached copyright, jury rules

Alone in a Burbank studio, Pharrell Williams started by "surfing around" for a drumbeat.

The Grammy Award-winning songwriter, who has sold more than 100 million records worldwide, then looked for chords that felt good. Once he got a "groove" going, he later recalled, he let it speak to him. When he found a melody "that sticks and shimmers", it told him what the song should be about, and he started scratching down lyrics.

In all, it took less than an hour, Williams testified this month. The tune, Blurred Lines, went on to become the biggest of 2013 and to bring in millions each for Williams, singer Robin Thicke and the record company.

That obscure process - "magic," Williams' attorney called it - and what if any part the late soul singer and songwriter Marvin Gaye played in it, were the subject of a two-week-long trial in a downtown federal courtroom in which dark-suited attorneys, music experts, valuation experts and musicians argued over the age-old question of where inspiration ends and theft begins.