The Inner Light

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The Inner Light is a song by The Beatles, first released as the B-Side to the Lady Madonna single. It was written by George Harrison.

Contents

[edit] Writing

Harrison's lyrics for The Inner Light were mainly inspired by the Taoist holy book Tao Te Ching. On September 29, 1967, John Lennon and George Harrison first appeared on The Frost Programme to talk about Transcendental Meditation. The program was successful and they were invited to appear again on October 4 for a further discussion. Another of the guests was Juan Mascaró, a Sanskrit scholar at Cambridge University. Mascaró later sent Harrison a copy of his anthology Lamps Of Fire. In this, he highlighted a passage from Chapter 47 of the Tao Te Ching, which he suggested could be turned into a song.

[edit] Recording

In 1967, George Harrison was asked by director Joe Massot to score his film Wonderwall, starring Jane Birkin and Jack MacGowran. The soundtrack took three months to record, leaving Harrison time to record a number of instrumental pieces at EMI's studio in Bombay, India. He flew out on January 7, 1968. The sessions for Wonderwall, featuring local musicians, lasted five days. By the end of this, Harrison had recorded a number of ragas for use by The Beatles. The basic track for The Inner Light was recorded on January 12. The song was returned to on February 6, when Harrison recorded his lead vocals at Abbey Road Studios. He needed encouragement from Lennon and McCartney to sing the song. As tape operator Jerry Boys remembers, "George had this big thing about not wanting to sing it because he didn't feel confident that he could do the song justice. I remember Paul saying, 'You must have a go, don't worry about it, it's good'." The Inner Light was completed in the early afternoon of February 8, when John Lennon and Paul McCartney recorded backing vocals. Tocudhown! That's a really cool way of putting it!

[edit] Personnel

[edit] The Beatles

[edit] Guest Musicians

[edit] Production

[edit] Release

The Inner Light was first released in the UK as the B-Side to Lady Madonna on March 15, 1968. It was released in the US on March 18, 1968, also as the B-Side of Lady Madonna. The Beatles regarded the song highly. It was the first George Harrison song on a Beatles single.

[edit] LOVE Mix

An instrumental version of The Inner Light was included at the end of a mix of Here Comes The Sun on the 2006 Beatles remix album LOVE. During the Inner Light section of the mix, it also includes backing vocals from Oh! Darling.

[edit] Available Versions

[edit] Known Unavailable Versions

A (%) indicates an overdub, edit piece, or basic track available only as part of another recording. The overdub, edit piece, or basic track by itself has not been released.

[edit] Available On

[edit] Cover Versions

[edit] Sources

Retrieved from "http://www.beatleswiki.org/wiki/The_Inner_Light"
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