A Quick Story About The Beatles and The Waltz
This well-known dance originated in Germany in the 16th century and is derived from the word walzer which means “to roll or revolve”. It requires the dancers to be in a touching & closed position and for centuries was very popular with the lower peasant class as a folk dance. In the late 1770’s it became fashionable with higher society gradually replacing the minuet in popularity for ballroom dancing.
But, in the early going, a dark side existed with some observers. In a 1771 novel, a high-minded character complains about the newly introduced waltz writing “But when he put his arm around her, pressed her to his breast, cavorted with her in the shameless, indecent whirling-dance and engaged in a familiarity that broke all the bounds of good breeding”. The devil’s in the details after all!
Musically speaking, the distinct rhythm is played in a 3/4 time signature and its catchy 1–2–3 meter is repeated throughout the song. The dance itself has fallen by the wayside in mass popularity many years ago, but its familiar rhythm remains in use today and has been employed in many important songs in numerous genres including:
· “I’m So Lonely I Could Cry” by Country music legend Hank Williams.
· “My Favorite Things” by Pop artist Julie Andrews in the musical The Sound of Music.
· “Hallelujah” the anthemic hit song by Canadian songwriter Leonard Cohen.
· “Piano Man” by Billy Joel.
· “The House of the Rising Sun” by The Animals.
· “Can’t Help Falling In Love” by Elvis Presley.
· “Nothing Else Matters” by Heavy Metal band Metallica.
· “I Got You Babe” by Pop duet Sonny and Cher.
· “Manic Depression” by guitar legend Jimi Hendrix.
· “The Times They Are A-Changin” by Folk legend Bob Dylan.
· “Kiss From A Rose” by British Soul artist Seal.
· “With A Little Help From My Friends” by British Blues artist Joe Cocker. It’s this final example that will allow me to segway to the Beatles use of the 3/4 meter.
Joe Cocker’s fantastic cover version of the Beatles song is interesting because the Beatles used a syncopated 4/4 rhythm which made both contrasting versions so attention-grabbing. Cocker reached No1 in the UK in 1968 and established him as a star.
Here are the Beatle songs using a waltzy 3/4 rhythm listed in their recorded chronological order.
1964
· “Baby’s in Black” — This was their first use of 3/4, and it was co-written by John and Paul. According to Paul the rhythm choice was heavily influenced by the 1961 American hit “If You Gotta Make A Fool of Somebody”. This song was a staple in their live shows as shown below in 1966.
1965
· “You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away” — This Bob Dylan influenced song was mostly written by John and performed in their 2nd movie Help. It was his first recording use of an acoustic 12-string guitar. Here’s the film clip.
· “Norwegian Wood” — Another mostly John song. This was the first use of an Indian sitar in a pop recording.
1966
· “For No One” — This beautiful ballad was written by Paul while on vacation. Ringo was the only other studio participant from the band. John referred to it as “one of his favorites of McCartney’s”.
1967
· “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” — This psychedelic beauty was mostly written by John. The video is fantastic!
· “She’s Leaving Home” — This gorgeous ballad was written by Paul, but John contributed the countermelody. The video is filmed in Red Square (Moscow) in 2003.
1968
· “Happiness Is A Warm Gun” — This song uses many time signatures including 3/4 in the “I need a fix cause I’m going down…” section. It was written by John.
· “Long, Long, Long” — Another beautiful ballad, but this time by George.
1969
· “Oh ! Darling” — This fantastic rock ballad was written by Paul.
· “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” — The 3/4 meter is used in the 3:00 minute long outro instrumental section and it was written by John.
1970
· “I Me Mine” — Their final recording session (1/3/1970), but John wasn’t present due to vacation conflict. But he did waltz with Yoko while they rehearsed it. The song was written by George.
These 10 original Beatle songs constitute a small fraction of their total body of work. But here are a few of my observations:
· They intentionally spread songs that employed this meter over most of their albums after 1964. Using their UK album release pattern, 8 out 10 of those albums had a song using this waltzy rhythm.
· As was the case in an article I recently published titled The Beatles Mastery of Using Time Signature Shifts, John was the most frequent user of meter shifts. He was the primary writer of over 50% of the above list. As I mentioned in the beforementioned article, these subtle shifts were one of the many reasons Beatle music was [and is] so revered. They obsessed with being unpredictable with their listeners by using hard to describe technical subtleties.
· For the most part, these songs were all really good but none of them were released on a single. Obviously, they didn’t view them as stand-alone commercial candidates. Could the time signature played a role in their thinking? I don’t know the answer, but I believe some of these are superior to some of their B-sides choices of US single releases like “Misery” (1965) or “What Goes On” (1966).
Fun Fact: Paul McCartney and his band Wings released “Mull of Kintyre” in 1977 using this same time signature. In the UK, it went to No1 and was the first single to sell 2 million copies. Fittingly, it was on the B-side. The video is very good.
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