Blackbird

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Blackbird is a song off The Beatles' 1968 self-titled album. It was written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon/McCartney.

Contents

[edit] Writing

Blackbird was written shortly after The Beatles' trip to India in early 1968. McCartney had written it on his farm in Scotland. Shortly afterwards, on the first night that McCartney's future first wife Linda Eastman stayed at McCartney's house, McCartney performed the song to fans waiting outside his gates. One of the fans, Margo Stevens, recalls, "A few of us were there. We had the feeling something was going to happen. Paul didn't take the Mini inside the way he usually did - he parked it on the road and he and Linda walked right past us. They went inside and we stood there, watching different lights in the house go on and off. In the end, the light went on in the Mad Room, at the top of the house, where he kept all his music stuff and his toys. Paul opened the window and called out to us, 'Are you still down there?' 'Yes,' we said. He must have been really happy that night. He sat on the window sill with his acoustic guitar and sang Blackbird to us as we stood down there in the dark." McCartney has said that the song was inspired by Bach's Bouree in E Minor, which both McCartney and George Harrison learned to play on guitar at a young age. McCartney recalled in his authorized biography, Many Years From Now, "Part of its structure is a particular harmonic thing between the melody and the bass line which intrigued me. Bach was always one of our favourite composers; we felt we had a lot in common with him... I developed the melody on guitar based on the Bach piece and took it somewhere else, took it to another level, then I just fitted the words to it." The song features many time signature changes. The line "Blackbird singing in the dead of night" is in 3/4 time, while most of the rest of te song is in 4/4 or 2/4 time. The guitar tuning was also unusual, with the E strings on the guitar being tuned down to D. The lyrics were inspired by the civil rights movement going on in America at the time. The 'blackbird' of the title is said to represent an African-American woman of the era. McCartney recalls, "I had in mind a black woman, rather than a bird. Those were the days of the civil rights movement, which all of us cared passionately about, so this was really a song from me to a black woman, experiencing these problems in the States: 'Let me encourage you to keep trying, to keep your faith, there is hope.' As is often the case with my things, a veiling took place so, rather than say 'Black woman living in Little Rock' and be very specific, she became a bird, became symbolic, so you could apply it to your particular problem."

[edit] Recording

Blackbird was recorded on June 11, 1968 in thirty-two takes. The recording only featured Paul singing and playing guitar while accompanied by a metronome. It was taped in studio two of Abbey Road Studios while John worked on Revolution 9 next door. Out of the thirty-two takes recorded, only eleven were complete, with the last being considered best. McCartney then overdubbed more vocals and more guitar onto this. Sound effects of a bird from Abbey Road's library were also included on the four-track recording. Engineer Stuart Eltham recalls recording the bird sounds, "I taped that on one of the first portable EMI tape recorders, in my back garden in Ickenham, about 1965. There are two recordings, one of the bird singing, the other making an alarm sound when I startled it." Take four of Blackbird was included on the 1996 compilation Anthology 3. It transposes the last verse with a "Blackbird fly, into the light of the dark black night" section.

[edit] Recording Sessions

[edit] LOVE Mix

A mix of this song is included on the 2006 Beatles remix album LOVE. An instrumental section without the bird sounds was included at the beginning of a mix of Yesterday.

[edit] Personnel

[edit] The Beatles

[edit] Production

[edit] Available Versions

[edit] The Beatles

[edit] Paul McCartney

  • To Be Completed...

[edit] Available On

[edit] Cover Versions

[edit] Source

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