"Getting Better"

A couple weeks ago, I watched Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years and Sgt. Pepper's Musical Revolution when they were broadcast on PBS.  I'm a bit skeptical of some of the assertions that Howard Goodall presents in Sgt. Pepper's Musical Revolution, but I did notice a small thing about "Getting Better" while watching it.  The "Filling me up" part of the line "Filling me up with your rules" ascends (D E F G), which musically represents the "filling... up."

While referencing the recording just now, I also discovered that "You're holding me down" (the first half of the preceding line) descends.  "Holding me down" is sung to the phrase E D D D C (with "down" sung to two syllables with the second at a lower pitch than the first, which emphasizes the effect).  Similarly, "Me hiding me head in the sand" descends (roughly diatonically from E to B), which almost represents the subterranean caching.

"Old Brown Shoe"

Last week I listened to all three of the Anthology albums (in two days).  One part during the bridge of "Old Brown Shoe" caught my attention.  In the demo version on Anthology 3, it's played on guitar alone, but in the single version, it's played on guitar and bass.  The phrase sounded familiar to me, and after some research, I discovered that it bears some resemblance to the bass part in Chuck Berry's "Go Go Go."

I learned enough of each part to be able to compare them.  Almost all of the bass part during the verses of "Go Go Go" alternates between these two measures:

And the bass part at the beginning of the bridge in "Old Brown Shoe" is something like:

There are two similarities between these two parts.  First, both phrases have triplets on the third and fourth beats of the measure (although this is in only every other measure in "Go Go Go").  Second, both phrase arpeggiate chords in the same way.  They're different chords, but the bass plays the root, third, fifth, and sixth.  The bass part in "Go Go Go" continues ascending to play the root an octave higher in the second measure, and the bass part in "Old Brown Shoe" plays a second when it descends, but they start out the same (although, admittedly, a root-third-fifth-sixth arpeggiation in the bass isn't that distinctive).

After I realized this similarity, I thought about the bass part in "I Saw Her Standing There," which, adjusted for key, consists of the same phrases as the bass part in Chuck Berry's "I'm Talking about You."  Initially, I thought Paul McCartney nicked an-other bass part from a Chuck Berry song, but then I lookt in the liner notes of Anthology 3 to find that all of the parts in the demo of "Old Brown Shoe" (so, obviously, including this phrase) were played by George Harrison.  Evidently, it was he who came up with this phrase.  I'm not sure whether the bass part in Berry's "Go Go Go" was any influence, but the two parts do have a certain similarity and the Beatles were obviously familiar with other Chuck Berry songs.

"The Long and Winding Road"

"The Long and Winding Road" was the subject of a Jeopardy! clue yester-day (the correct response was "What is Let It Be?"), so last night I decided to figure out a part from it.  I think I got the electric piano solo from the version on Let It Be... Naked (I might have only the right hand of a two-handed part though). In any case, I noticed something about it.  I think it's something like:

As with all the parts I've figured out and my notation, there's the disclaimer that I might be wrong about something.

The first few notes sounded familiar, and it didn't take me too long to place them.  Bach's Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 645 (which I'd listened to the day before) begins with these same notes (in the same key and with the same upbeat):

(notation found here)

I'm not sure if the beginning of this part is intended to sound like the beginning of Bach's piece, but there is a certain similarity.

"Eight Days a Week"

Since last November, I've been slowly reading Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions.  A couple weeks ago, I read the entry for 6 October 1964 (p. 49) in which Lewisohn claims that "Eight Days a Week" was "the first pop song to feature a faded-up introduction."

Yester-day was Chuck Berry's birthday, so I listened to some of his music and rediscovered that the introduction in "Down Bound Train" also fades in.  "Eight Days a Week" is from 1964, but "Down Bound Train" is from 1956.

Here are screen clippings of the wave forms:

"Down Bound Train"

"Eight Days a Week"

I'm not sure if "Down Bound Train" could be classified as a "pop song," but it's certainly a song with a faded-in introduction that predates "Eight Days a Week."  Likewise, I'm not sure if the Beatles were familiar with this particular song (although they certainly were familiar with other Chuck Berry songs) or if the faded-in introduction of "Down Bound Train" had anything to do with the faded-in introduction of "Eight Days a Week."

"Sun King"

Last night I learned one of the guitar tracks and the bass part for the first section of "Sun King."  Of course, I learned the guitar part that's easier; the other one is probably more interesting.

I'd tried learning this guitar part one other time, but I got confused by the double stop.  I think I have the right notes now, but I'm not sure I play it very well.

"You Know What to Do"

I learned the chords for "You Know What to Do" earlier this month, so - when I had the opportunity a couple weeks ago - I recorded a version.  Because I used the Beatles' demo (which is a bit rough) as a template and because I'm not as familiar with "You Know What to Do" as I am with some other Beatles songs, my version isn't the best (it doesn't help that I'm not a very good tambourine player).  Still, I don't think it turned out too badly.

Their version just sort of trails off, but I resolved mine.

"You Know What to Do"

A couple days ago, I learned the chords for "You Know What to Do."  According to the liner notes of Anthology 1, it's a demo of a George Harrison song that the Beatles never properly recorded.  In any case, I noticed some connections between the chord progression and the lyrics in the bridge.

To start with, here are the chords (with the disclaimer that - as always - I might have something wrong).  There's an initial D major before the first verse.

Verses:
|: A major | E major :|

Choruses:
|: A major | E major :| A major | D major

Bridge:
B minor | D augmented | A major | D major

The chord progression is comprised of major chords until the bridge, which starts with a B minor.  Appropriately, the mood in the lyrics also changes here:  "Just call on me when you're lonely."  Following that B minor is a D augmented, with an A# accidental that also contributes to the desolate feeling of loneliness.

There's a parallelism (of sorts) between the first and last lines of the bridge, both lyrically and musically.  The lyrical parallelism is obvious:  "Just call on me when you're lonely" is only a few words different from "I'll call on you if I'm lonely too."  The "too" emphasizes the similarity.  The musical parallelism is a bit obscure (and less exact).  There's a B minor played for the entire first line, and there's a D major at the very end (corresponding to the "too" in "I'll call on you if I'm lonely too").  These are closely related chords:  B minor is the relative minor of D major, and D major is the relative major of B minor.  So in the bridge, there's a close relationship between the first and last lines and between the first and last chords.  Accordingly, the speaker/singer wishes for a close relationship between himself and the girl to whom he addresses the song.

"Baby You're a Rich Man"

I listened to Magical Mystery Tour this morning, and the line "Tuned to a natural E" in "Baby You're a Rich Man" caught my attention.  I'd wondered whether the vocal line there is actually singing "E" to an E note, but I'd never actually lookt into it.  I finally did, and I discovered that neither the lead vocal nor the harmony vocal sing an E note there.  The lead vocal sings a G, and the harmony vocal sings a C.  For what it's worth: adding an E would result in a C major chord, and the song is in C major.

"Every Little Thing"

Because yester-day was the 40th anniversary of Elvis' death, I've been listening to his music lately.  This evening I learned the chords and about half of the solo for "That's All Right," and I discovered a feature that I think might have influenced the Beatles.

I referenced the version of "That's All Right" that the Beatles did on the BBC (slightly retitled to "That's All Right (Mama)") and found that they performed the song in the same key that Elvis did:  A major.  In both Elvis' version and the Beatles' cover, the beginning of the solo alternates between a diatonic ascent starting on a low E and phrases higher up on the guitar neck.  In tablature, this ascending phrase is:

E|-0-2-4-5-

As a phrase, I don't think this is that distinctive; however, "Every Little Thing" from Beatles for Sale structures it the same way: the beginning of the solo alternates between this phrase and phrases higher up on the guitar neck (although I think the phrases are played on two separate instruments).

I checkt the chronology, and the Beatles' cover of "That's All Right" does precede "Every Little Thing."  According to the liner notes of Live at the BBC, it was recorded 2 July 1963 and transmitted 16 July 1963.  According to Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, "Every Little Thing" was recorded in late September 1964.

It seems relevant to note that the Beatles' cover of "That's All Right" also includes this phrase in the bass part.  Their version starts with that phrase where Elvis' version begins simply with guitar strumming.

"Lucille"

I listened to the first disc of Live at the BBC to-day.  Introducing "Lucille," Brian Matthew - the presenter - says, "The Beatles, with Paul McCartney paying tribute to the Everlys with 'Lucille.'"  It struck me as a bit odd that it's the Everly Brothers' version of "Lucille" that's mentioned.  On the second disc of Live at the BBC, the Beatles do perform the Everlys' "So How Come (No One Loves Me)," but it seems to me that Little Richard, who did the original version of "Lucille," was a greater influence.  The Beatles covered a number of his songs:  "Ooh! My Soul" on the BBC (which is also on Live at the BBC), "Long Tall Sally" (with a instrumental quotation of "The Girl Can't Help It") on the Long Tall Sally EP, and "Kansas City/Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey" on Beatles for Sale.

I compared four recordings of "Lucille":  Little Richard's original, the Everly Brothers' cover, and two versions that the Beatles did on the BBC (one on Live at the BBC and the other on On Air - Live at the BBC, Vol. 2).  Little Richard's is in C major, as are the two versions by the Beatles, but the Everlys' is in G major.  As far as the key goes, it does seem like their version of "Lucille" is based more on Little Richard's than the Everlys'.

"We Can Work It Out"

I recently heard "We Can Work It Out," and I realized that there's a time signature change in the bridge.  It's mostly 4/4, but it changes to 3/4 for "fighting, my friend" and again at "ask you once again."  At first I just thought, "Oh, there's an-other Beatles song that mixes time signatures."  I learned years ago that "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" does this (the verses are in 3/4 and the choruses in 4/4), and I recently discovered that the end of "Mean Mr. Mustard" changes time signatures too.

I got thinking about this later though, and I realized that this change in time signature is significant with regard to the lyrics.  The first couplet of the bridge is "Life is very short, and there's no time / For fussing and fighting, my friend."  In that change from 4/4 to 3/4, there's one fewer beat in a measure, so there's a musical representation of the brevity that's mentioned in the previous line.

"Mean Mr. Mustard"

I recently figured out and notated the bass part for "Mean Mr. Mustard."  I don't really have much to say about it, but I'd like to draw attention to how - apparently without reason - it changes from 4/4 to 3/4 at the end.  I hadn't noticed that until I notated it.

I think there's a drum bit at the beginning, so the song actually starts with an up-beat, but I didn't include that in my notation; I just started it when the bass starts.  As always, there's the disclaimer that I might have something wrong (especially the notes in the last measure, which were a bit difficult to distinguish because the track break between "Mean Mr. Mustard" and "Polythene Pam" falls in between those last two measures).