Global Music Rights (GMR) has settled its copyright infringement lawsuit against Music Choice.
The case was dismissed with prejudice on Friday (August 7), according to a joint stipulation filed in the US District Court for the Central District of California, which you can read here.
It closes the dispute two months after GMR sued the music service over the alleged unauthorized performance of 95 songs.
The four-page filing states that “the Parties have entered into a settlement agreement to dispose of this action in its entirety.”
The action was dismissed “with prejudice in its entirety, with each party bearing its own attorneys’ fees, costs, and expenses,” barring GMR from bringing the same claims again.
Neither the financial terms of the settlement nor any licensing arrangement between the two companies is disclosed in the document, which was signed by counsel for both sides on August 7.
The court had twice approved extensions to Music Choice‘s deadline to respond to the complaint, first to July 27 and then to August 10, the stipulation notes.
The stipulation was filed three days before that second deadline expired, and no response to the complaint appears on the docket.
GMR filed the complaint on June 8, alleging that Music Choice continued performing songs from its catalog after the companies’ license agreement lapsed on December 31, 2025.
The PRO sought maximum statutory damages of USD $150,000 for each of the 95 compositions, a ceiling of roughly USD $14.25 million, plus a permanent injunction, attorneys’ fees and costs.
Works named in an exhibit to the complaint included Bruce Springsteen‘s Born to Run and Dancing in the Dark, plus Bad Guy and What Was I Made For? by Billie Eilish and Finneas, as MBW reported at the time.
The complaint described the alleged infringement as “willful, intentional, purposeful, and in disregard of and indifferent to the rights of Global Music Rights.”
“Music Choice made the strategic decision not to pay Global Music Rights for these uses and hoped to get away with it,” it read.
“But Music Choice did not get away with it. Music Choice has been caught red handed.”
Announcing the suit in June, GMR General Counsel Emio Zizza said: “We only turn to litigation as a last resort. But it’s well-established law that our clients’ copyrighted works can’t be publicly performed without a license.”
Added Zizza: “The many, many services that have entered into a GMR license and are paying their fees deserve the benefit of that license.
“Services that don’t want to pay for a GMR license don’t get to use our catalog and deprive our clients of their due.”
Music Choice is the target of the fifth infringement case GMR has filed in federal court since October 2022.
Not one of those four earlier cases reached trial, and every one of the actions sought the same statutory maximum of USD $150,000 per work.
That figure is the ceiling set by US copyright law for willful infringement, and a rightsholder claiming statutory damages does not have to demonstrate what it actually lost.
In October 2022, GMR filed three cases on the same basis: against Red Wolf Broadcasting, against One Putt Broadcasting, and against Southern Stone Communications and Black Crow Media Group jointly.
It settled with Red Wolf and One Putt on January 20, 2023, with both companies entering long-term licenses on undisclosed terms.
“We are dedicated to protecting the rights of GMR songwriters and composers, and ensuring entities publicly performing their works are appropriately licensed,” Zizza said of that agreement.
“Through this lawsuit, we have accomplished those endeavors, and look forward to our go-forward licensing relationship with Red Wolf.”
GMR then sued Vermont Broadcast Associates in January 2024 over 66 songs, and settled three months later on terms that again included a long-term GMR license and a resolution of past alleged infringements.
The Music Choice stipulation does not say whether that pattern held a fifth time.
Music Choice is based in Horsham, Pennsylvania, and has operated in the music industry for close to four decades, according to GMR‘s complaint.
The company says it has been a staple in the home for more than 35 years, growing out of cable television into what it calls “a multi-platform experience built for how people listen today.”
Its channels come with most cable packages, and Music Choice also sells a standalone subscription for mobile devices and select smart TVs.
A separate arm, Music Choice for Business, supplies music to commercial premises.
The company is owned by a consortium that includes Sony Corporation of America, Charter Communications, Comcast Corporation, Cox Communications and Microsoft, according to the complaint.
Music Choice‘s business establishment service has attracted litigation before.
SoundExchange sued Music Choice in April 2019, alleging that an audit had found the company underreporting the gross proceeds on which its statutory sound recording royalties were calculated.
A federal judge referred that dispute to the Copyright Royalty Board in December 2021, finding the Board better placed to interpret its own rate regulation.
The lawyer who acted for Music Choice in that defense turns up again in the GMR stipulation.
Music Choice was represented in the GMR case by Kelly Perigoe of King & Spalding in Los Angeles, and by Paul Fakler, a partner in the firm’s New York office, listed in the filing with his pro hac vice application still to come.
King & Spalding says Fakler acted for Music Choice in the SoundExchange litigation.
The firm says he has also handled Music Choice‘s Preexisting Subscription Service rate case before the Copyright Royalty Board, along with “every prior rate proceeding for Music Choice since the creation of the CRB.”
Fakler‘s clients have included Sirius XM, Pandora and Google, and he joined King & Spalding from Mayer Brown in January 2026.
Acting for GMR were Daniel Petrocelli and David Marroso of O’Melveny & Myers.
Petrocelli has been GMR‘s lead counsel since its December 2016 antitrust countersuit against the Radio Music License Committee, and O’Melveny has acted on the PRO’s infringement suits ever since.
GMR was founded in 2013 by Irving Azoff and Randy Grimmett, and represents just over 175 songwriters and their publishers, according to its complaint.
It is one of four PROs operating in the United States, alongside ASCAP, BMI and SESAC.
MBW revealed in September 2024 that GMR had struck a deal with private equity firm Hellman & Friedman valuing the company at USD $3.3 billion.
Jeff Toig was promoted from Chief Business Officer to CEO in January 2026, with Grimmett moving up to Executive Chairman.
Enforcement across the wider PRO sector has been active this year: ASCAP announced infringement suits against four US radio groups on June 9, the day after GMR sued Music Choice.Music Business Worldwide
