A federal appeals court has revived a copyright infringement lawsuit against artists Sam Smith and Normani over their 2019 hit “Dancing with a Stranger,” overturning a lower court’s decision to dismiss the case and setting the stage for a jury to consider the merits of the claim.

In a ruling issued Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that a jury could reasonably conclude that the song’s hook is substantially similar to one in a 2015 track of the same name by Jordan Vincent and music duo SKX. The court said the case should not have been dismissed at an early stage, emphasizing the need for fact-finding when evaluating the originality and similarity of musical compositions.

The suit was brought in 2022 by Sound and Color LLC, which owns the copyright to the earlier song "Dancing with Strangers." The plaintiffs alleged that Smith and Normani’s composition copied key creative elements, including the title, lyrics, melody, and overall production. Although the newer song has a slower tempo, the plaintiffs argued that when tempo is adjusted, both songs share striking similarities, especially in the structure and content of the hooks.

The lower court had previously ruled in favor of the artists, holding that the phrase "dancing with a stranger" was too generic to be protected and that the two songs were not substantially similar. But the appeals court disagreed, highlighting expert testimony asserting that both hooks share the same combination of musical elements, including identical lyrics, similar melodic contours, and metric placement of syllables. These similarities, the panel wrote, presented a question best left to a jury.

“Defendants’ experts do not identify any hook in the prior art that shares that same melodic contour with those starting and ending pitches,” the court noted. While the defense argued that Vincent’s song warranted only thin copyright protection, the court rejected that approach, finding that the range of creative choices available in songwriting supports broader protection.

The decision is part of a trend in the 9th Circuit to allow copyright cases over creative works to proceed to trial rather than being resolved on early motions. The court has reversed dismissals in other high-profile cases, reflecting a growing reluctance to resolve disputes over originality without jury involvement.

The case now returns to a California federal district court, where a jury will determine whether Smith and Normani’s song infringed on the earlier work. The ruling may signal increased legal exposure for artists accused of copying or borrowing musical elements, even amid a legal landscape where defendants like Ed Sheeran have recently prevailed in copyright trials.