"Dizzy Miss Lizzy"

Yester-day, I listened to Live at the Hollywood Bowl and noticed some significant melismas in "Dizzy Miss Lizzy."  In order to write this post, though, I referenced the studio recording.

In the lines "The way you rock and roll" and "When you do the stroll," "roll" and "stroll" are both sung with melismas (I think they're E D C# and E C# A, respectively), musically giving a sense of movement.

In the line "Love me 'fore I grow too old," "old" is sung with a melisma (B A), giving a sense of degree (for "too"), and similarly, in the line "Ooh, girl, you look so fine," "fine" is sung with a melisma (E C# A, I think), giving a sense of degree (for "so").

"Dizzy Miss Lizzy"

Backdated, archival post

[link to original on tumblr]

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I listened to Help! yester-day for my Collection Audit project, and later I tried figuring out some parts.  The guitar riff in "Dizzy Miss Lizzy" is only three pitches, so it was really easy to figure out.  The bass part is fairly simple, but it's a bit difficult to play part of it at this speed.

This is only the introduction and the first verse (and of that, just the guitar and bass), but it's strophic, so these parts are just repeated.