Elvis Presley rights holders sue Anthropic over 274 songs used to train Claude

An Authentic Brands Group unit that holds Elvis Presley rights sued Anthropic on 23 October 2026, according to Billboard, alleging the company trained Claude on 274 copyrighted Presley songs without permission [1][3]. The case, filed in federal court in Northern California, is the latest of several music copyright suits against the Claude maker [1][5].

What does the Elvis lawsuit claim?

ABG EPE IP LLC sued Anthropic in the US District Court for the Northern District of California on 23 October 2026. The docket lists case number 5:26-cv-12473 and a complaint as its only entry so far [1].

Billboard reports that the complaint accuses Anthropic of infringing 274 copyrighted Elvis Presley songs. According to Billboard, the named works include “Can’t Help Falling in Love,” “Don’t Be Cruel,” “A Little Less Conversation” and “All Shook Up” [3]. Billboard says the suit was filed by a unit of Authentic Brands Group, which controls much of the Presley song catalog, and co-filed by other entities that own Elvis rights [3].

Like earlier music cases, the suit claims Anthropic used the songs to build technology that produces “unlicensed derivative works,” Billboard reports [3]. Busch previously represented Marvin Gaye's estate in the “Blurred Lines” copyright case, Billboard notes [3]. These are allegations; no court has ruled on them.

How much money is at stake?

Rolling Stone reports that the suit seeks $150,000 per song, or roughly $41 million in total. That figure from Rolling Stone [4] matches the statutory maximum for willful infringement multiplied by 274 works. The complaint itself was not yet readable in the free court archive, so we could not check the figure against the filing [1].

How does this connect to the Reservoir suits?

Two days earlier, on 21 October, the same lead lawyer, Richard Busch, filed a complaint for music publisher Reservoir against Anthropic in the same court [2]. That complaint lists 853 compositions and puts statutory damages at $127,950,000 [2]. Reservoir also sued AI song generator Suno over 1,050 works the same day, Music Business Worldwide reports [5].

The Reservoir complaint alleges that Claude, asked to recreate songs “for a modern audience,” admitted its versions were “edging past ‘inspired by’ into reproducing the copyrighted song” [2]. Rolling Stone quotes the same passage from the Elvis lawsuit [4].

Where does Anthropic stand?

A representative for Anthropic did not immediately respond to Billboard's request for comment on Saturday [3]. AI companies generally argue that training on copyrighted works is fair use, an issue still pending in dozens of lawsuits, according to Billboard [3].

According to Music Business Worldwide, Anthropic is already defending music cases brought by Concord, Universal Music Publishing Group and ABKCO, by BMG, and by Sony Music Publishing and Warner Chappell [5]. It agreed in September 2025 to pay $1.5 billion to settle a class action by book authors over pirated books, the outlet reports [5].

Our read

Opinion: The Elvis suit adds star power more than new legal theory; it reuses the Reservoir playbook almost word for word, down to the same Claude quote. The real pressure on Anthropic is the stacking: one lawyer filing catalog after catalog at the statutory maximum turns fair use from an abstract defence into a running tally that makes licensing deals look cheap.

What we could not verify

• The exact song count and damages: the complaint (docket entry 1) was not yet available in the free RECAP archive, so the figure of 274 songs comes from Billboard and the 150,000 dollars per song and roughly 41 million dollar total come from Rolling Stone.
• Which other Elvis rights entities co-filed the suit and the full list of claims; Billboard says other entities joined, but the docket does not yet list parties or causes of action.
• Rolling Stone names the case ABE EPE LLC v. Anthropic, while the court docket lists the plaintiff as ABG EPE IP LLC; we use the docket name.
• Whether Claude was actually trained on the songs or reproduces them; these are allegations, and Anthropic had not responded to Billboard's request for comment, and we found no public statement at publication.