Ed Sheeran made a surprise appearance at Radio 1’s Big Weekend on Saturday, where he performed a new song inspired by his $100 million copyright trial.

The singer, 34, wrote the track after revisiting an old phone during the lawsuit over his hit ‘Thinking Out Loud.’

He had been accused of copying Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On but was cleared in court in 2023.  

Now, taking to the stage at the Liverpool-based festival, Ed opened up about the inspiration behind his new song Old Phone before performing it for the first time in front of a crowd. 

Referring to his copyright trail, told the crowd: ‘The judge ordered me to give up my old devices to the other lawyers for them to go through all my text messages and emails and photos and stuff like that.

‘And in that process I switched on a phone that I had not looked at in 10 years and it was like looking into the past and it was conversations with people who had passed away.

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He continued: ‘There was arguments with an ex-girlfriend, there was, you know, text messages and pictures from people that I haven’t seen or spoken to in, in 10 years, and I wrote this song about it called Old phone.’

Ed’s performance was announced just moments before he surprised the crowd with his unexpected appearance. 

He told fans he chose to perform on the New Music Stage because it was the only one he hadn’t sung on yet. 

A source at Big Weekend told MailOnline: ‘Ed came on as a surprise guest kicking off the opening act on Saturday lunchtime, I’ve never seen festival goers swarm a stage so quickly.

‘He played a number of his hits and also included some of his new songs which the crowd the loved.

‘Ed explained the meaning behind his one new song where he opened up about his court case and how finding old phone was the inspiration.

‘As he started Azizam he did mess up his famous loop but he started again and told the crowd ‘that’s how you know I’m playing live’.

‘He was on for an hour and nearly ran over time but the crowd didn’t want it to end.’

During his set in Liverpool, Ed also performed fan favourites including Castle on the Hill, Shivers, The A-Team, and Photograph.

He went on to perform his hit Shape of You before closing the epic, surprise show with Bad Habits.

It comes after Ed broke down in tears in March 2023 after a jury found his hit song Thinking Out Loud did not copy Marvin Gaye’s classic ‘Let’s Get It On’.

As the jury at Manhattan federal court cleared Ed of infringing copyright, he briefly put his hands over his face in relief before standing and hugging his lawyer.

His co-writer Amy Wadge said she and Ed ‘had a few tears’ of relief after winning the $100million case.

Speaking outside the court, he said: ‘I’m just a guy with a guitar who loves writing music for people to enjoy. I am not and will not allow myself to be a piggy bank.’

Ed vehemently denied allegations that his song stole fundamental musical elements from Marvin’s song. 

The singer had staked his whole career on the case, vowing that he would be ‘done’ with music if found guilty.

Ed added: ‘I’m obviously very happy with the outcome of the case and it looks like I’m not having to retire from my day job after all.

‘At the same time I’m unbelievably frustrated that baseless claims like this are allowed to go to court at all.

‘We’ve spent the last eight years talking about two songs with dramatically different lyrics, melodies and four chords which are also different and used by songwriters every day all over the world.

‘These chords are common building blocks which were used to create music long before Let’s Get It On was written and will be used to create music long after we are all gone.

‘They are in a songwriter’s alphabet, our toolkit, and should be there for all of us to use.

‘No one owns them or the way they are played, in the same way that no one owns the color blue.’

He added that if the verdict had gone the other way ‘we might as well say goodbye to the creative freedom of songwriters’ and that artists need to be able to create original music ‘without worrying at every step on the way that said creativity will be wrongly called into question’.

‘It is devastating to be accused of stealing someone else’s song when we put so much work into our livelihoods,’ he added.

The singer also said he missed his grandmother’s funeral in Ireland because of the trial, and that he ‘won’t get that time back’.