Backstage pass to making of Led Zeppelin’s epic ‘Stairway’

“Rolling Stone reports Plant reconfirmed statements made earlier in the trial by both Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones that the song’s origins began at the country estate Headley Grange and not the Welsh cottage Bron-Yr-Aur, contradicting decades of Zeppelin mythology”.

Lawyers for Page and Plant have asked the judge to throw out the case before it goes to the jury.

Asked by his attorney to remember what the couplet was, he sighed before reciting the famous lines.

Under cross examination, the lawyer for the estate of Spirit guitarist Randy Wolfe, prodded Plant about whether the group performed other artists’ songs in their early years as a band before it more fully developed its own musical repertory.

Plant readily acknowledged that they had.

The club in Birmingham was a focal point for the local music scene, Plant said.

“In the realm of rock “n” roll and rhythm and blues”, Plant said, “there has always been cross-pollination. Without it you wouldn’t have had Little Richard, Larry Williams, the Beatles… all moving across space”.

Plant told a packed courtroom on Tuesday that he did not remember hanging out with members of the band Spirit after a Birmingham, England, show in 1970, though he said he and his wife were in a bad vehicle wreck and he has no memory of the evening. Robert had been at the club that night, but he and his then-wife were in a serious auto accident later that evening, and he claimed that he didn’t remember anything that happened that night.

“I really don’t recall any of the bands I saw there or everyone I ever hung out with”.

While an economist for Wolfe’s estate testified that works that include “Stairway” earned gross revenues of almost $60 million in the past five years, defense witnesses whittled that down.

While experts for the plaintiffs previously said there are many similarities between “Taurus” and the intro to the 1971 “Stairway”, Lawrence Ferrara said the likeness was limited.

Plant, wearing his long hair back in a pony tail, spoke softly during testimony, saying he and Page sat by a fire 45 years ago in a recording retreat where Page played the opening of what would become one of Led Zeppelin’s greatest hits.

Judge Gary Klausner told the jury of four men and four women that they must reach a unanimous verdict.

‘Robert and I were so in sync with musical composition at that time.

Plant’s testimony is considered an important element in the defense.

‘I did have a bad vehicle accident, ‘ he said. “Every measure is significant”.

David Woirhaye, the chief financial officer of Rhino Entertainment – which markets and distributes the Led Zeppelin catalog – testified that sales of “Stairway” resulted in revenues of $3.4 million during the five-year statutory period at issue in the case, not including publishing royalties.

Led Zeppelin’s lawyer, however, said the trust didn’t own the copyright and the passage in question was a common descending chord sequence in the public domain.

Similarly, the chief financial officer for Rhino Records, the record company that has reissued numerous band’s albums, said that after deducting the costs that went into making and distributing “Stairway, the company made $868,000 on the song during the time period in question”.