Who wrote it
Bitter Sweet Symphony
Written by Richard Ashcroft — credited to Jagger & Richards for 22 years
The Verve’s 1997 hit was written by Richard Ashcroft — but it was built on a short sample of an orchestral recording of a Rolling Stones song, and a dispute over that sample handed the entire writing credit, and the royalties, to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. They held it until 2019, when they gave it back.
The credit
Who wrote it
Definitive version The Verve’s 1997 recording — the band’s signature song and one of the defining tracks of its era.
What happened to the credit
‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’ sampled a few seconds of an orchestral version of the Rolling Stones’ ‘The Last Time’, recorded by the Andrew Loog Oldham Orchestra. The Verve licensed the sample from the recording’s owner (Decca) but, according to the Stones’ former manager Allen Klein and his company ABKCO, had not cleared the underlying composition.
In 1997 ABKCO prevailed: Jagger and Richards were awarded 100% of the publishing and royalties, and were credited as co-writers alongside Ashcroft — despite the song’s melody and words being his.
In 2019 Jagger and Richards agreed to sign the rights over to Ashcroft. Their manager confirmed future royalties would go to him, and that they no longer sought a writing credit — acknowledging, as far as they were concerned, that it is Richard Ashcroft’s song.
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Context
When a sample rewrote the credit
This is not a case of the public crediting the wrong person — it is one where the law, for two decades, credited the wrong people. Richard Ashcroft wrote the song; a dispute over a licensed sample transferred its authorship on paper to two musicians who had no hand in writing it.
We report the outcome rather than take a side on the original 1997 ruling: the writing credit and royalties were held by Jagger and Richards from 1997 to 2019, and were then voluntarily returned to Ashcroft. It is one of the clearest examples of songwriting credit being decided by rights law rather than by who wrote the song.
For 22 years the law said two men wrote a song they hadn't written.