0:00:02 > 0:00:05This programme contains some strong language
0:00:05 > 0:00:09- ENGINEER:- Sgt Pepper's Lonely... - Hearts Club Band.- Hearts Club Band. - Take one.- This is take one.
0:00:09 > 0:00:11ELECTRIC GUITAR
0:00:11 > 0:00:14On 1st June, 1967, a record was released
0:00:14 > 0:00:19that changed the rules of what a pop album could or should be.
0:00:19 > 0:00:22That album was the Beatles'
0:00:22 > 0:00:25Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
0:00:25 > 0:00:30# It was 20 years ago today Sgt Pepper taught the band to play
0:00:30 > 0:00:33# They've been going in and out of style... #
0:00:33 > 0:00:35Sgt Pepper was immediately acclaimed
0:00:35 > 0:00:37as a startling new advance for music.
0:00:37 > 0:00:41Nothing like it had been heard or seen before.
0:00:41 > 0:00:45# Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band... #
0:00:50 > 0:00:53It was the most expensive album cover yet produced -
0:00:53 > 0:00:55an artwork in itself.
0:00:55 > 0:00:59The lyrics, for the first time ever in a pop music LP,
0:00:59 > 0:01:00were printed on the sleeve.
0:01:00 > 0:01:05# Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends... #
0:01:05 > 0:01:08Sgt Pepper chimed with the times.
0:01:08 > 0:01:11It became the soundtrack to the '67 "summer of love".
0:01:13 > 0:01:15The music was psychedelic and visionary.
0:01:16 > 0:01:18In parts, that is.
0:01:20 > 0:01:22The most extraordinary thing about the album is that
0:01:22 > 0:01:27it's so firmly grounded in real life, not hippy fantasy.
0:01:27 > 0:01:30# Lovely Rita, meter maid... #
0:01:30 > 0:01:33Of the 13 songs on Sgt Pepper,
0:01:33 > 0:01:36around half were inspired by newspaper stories,
0:01:36 > 0:01:38pictures or everyday events.
0:01:38 > 0:01:43# Lovely Rita, meter maid Nothing can come between us...#
0:01:43 > 0:01:46Lovely Rita is addressed to a young woman
0:01:46 > 0:01:48who gives Paul a parking ticket.
0:01:48 > 0:01:53It's not a howl of rage, as you might expect, but a cheeky come-on.
0:01:53 > 0:01:58# Heading for home, you start to roam then you're in town... #
0:01:58 > 0:02:00A cornflake advert on TV inspired
0:02:00 > 0:02:04John's sardonic take on married suburban life,
0:02:04 > 0:02:06Good Morning Good Morning.
0:02:07 > 0:02:11- # I used to get mad at my school - Now I can't complain
0:02:11 > 0:02:15# The teachers that taught me weren't cool... #
0:02:15 > 0:02:19The different songwriting personalities work hand in hand.
0:02:19 > 0:02:23In Getting Better, we find Paul's message of sunny optimism...
0:02:23 > 0:02:27# I've got to admit it's getting better... #
0:02:27 > 0:02:29..mischievously undercut by John's "can't get no worse."
0:02:29 > 0:02:32# It can't get no worse... #
0:02:32 > 0:02:38# When I get older, losing my hair Many years from now... #
0:02:38 > 0:02:40One of the album's was famous songs
0:02:40 > 0:02:43was recorded after Paul's dad turned 64.
0:02:43 > 0:02:46# Birthday greetings Bottle of wine. #
0:02:48 > 0:02:49Most importantly of all,
0:02:49 > 0:02:53this breadth of subject matter is mirrored and underpinned
0:02:53 > 0:02:56by an extraordinary breadth of musical influences.
0:02:57 > 0:03:00The album may start off with up-to-the-minute hard rock,
0:03:00 > 0:03:04but then come echoes of folk, brass band and classical music,
0:03:04 > 0:03:07vaudeville, and the music of other cultures.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10# And the people...#
0:03:10 > 0:03:16This is the real revolution of Sgt Pepper - all styles are fair game.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20And this is what made it so very influential to later musicians -
0:03:20 > 0:03:23its sheer musical ambition and scope.
0:03:23 > 0:03:26# I read the news today Oh, boy... #
0:03:26 > 0:03:29With the help of newly invented studio techniques,
0:03:29 > 0:03:32the Beatles were making a kaleidoscope of sound
0:03:32 > 0:03:35the likes of which had never been heard before.
0:03:35 > 0:03:38# Newspaper taxis appear on the shore...#
0:03:38 > 0:03:41There are innovations and revelations
0:03:41 > 0:03:43on every track of the album.
0:03:43 > 0:03:45In this film, I'm going to look at just some of the songs
0:03:45 > 0:03:49in which I think the Beatles' brilliance at inventing
0:03:49 > 0:03:52and reinventing musical form is at its most striking.
0:03:52 > 0:03:57# Lucy in the sky with diamonds... #
0:03:57 > 0:04:01I'm going to do so with the help of never-heard-before outtakes,
0:04:01 > 0:04:04by unpicking the original master tapes,
0:04:04 > 0:04:08and eavesdropping on the Beatles' own studio conversations.
0:04:08 > 0:04:11- JOHN:- This time you get it in the middle of the song.
0:04:11 > 0:04:12HE CHUCKLES
0:04:12 > 0:04:14I had to laugh meself, you know.
0:04:19 > 0:04:22Let's start the Sgt Pepper story at the beginning -
0:04:22 > 0:04:26a momentous decision taken in August 1966.
0:04:26 > 0:04:33# Think I'm gonna be sad I think it's today...#
0:04:33 > 0:04:36The Beatles had been touring the world for three years,
0:04:36 > 0:04:40but the fun had drained away, along with the audibility of their music.
0:04:40 > 0:04:43They'd had enough, so they decided to give up touring altogether.
0:04:45 > 0:04:47This looked like madness.
0:04:47 > 0:04:50A pop group's success depended on playing their music live
0:04:50 > 0:04:52so the audience would buy the records,
0:04:52 > 0:04:55which were made quickly and cheaply.
0:04:57 > 0:04:59Paul, can I just have a brief word with you?
0:04:59 > 0:05:01It's gone downhill, performance,
0:05:01 > 0:05:04Cos we can't develop when no-one can hear us, you know what I mean?
0:05:04 > 0:05:06So for us to perform, it's difficult,
0:05:06 > 0:05:08it gets difficult each time. More difficult.
0:05:08 > 0:05:09Do you mean they don't listen to you
0:05:09 > 0:05:11and therefore you don't want to do that?
0:05:11 > 0:05:14Yeah, we want to do it, but if we're not listened to,
0:05:14 > 0:05:17and we can't even hear ourselves, then we can't improve in that.
0:05:17 > 0:05:19We can't get any better.
0:05:19 > 0:05:23So we're trying to get better with things like recording.
0:05:23 > 0:05:24How are you? Can I stop you?
0:05:24 > 0:05:28Work began at Abbey Road in November '66.
0:05:28 > 0:05:31The Beatles would be there for an unprecedented five months.
0:05:31 > 0:05:32Having given up touring,
0:05:32 > 0:05:36they didn't need to make music that could be played live.
0:05:36 > 0:05:39Instead, with producer George Martin, they could turn the studio
0:05:39 > 0:05:41into an audio laboratory,
0:05:41 > 0:05:45pushing the possibilities of recording technology to new limits.
0:05:46 > 0:05:50Together, they constructed a sound layer by layer,
0:05:50 > 0:05:52track by track, instrument by instrument -
0:05:52 > 0:05:54a method soon to be the norm
0:05:54 > 0:05:57for more or less every artist in the world.
0:05:57 > 0:05:59DRUM TRACK FOR SGT PEPPER'S REPRISE
0:05:59 > 0:06:01Take 13.
0:06:01 > 0:06:03- PAUL:- Ringo, keep it a bit straighter at the end,
0:06:03 > 0:06:06keep it a bit straighter. Do a couple of bits, but...
0:06:07 > 0:06:11Cos, see, it's got to edit in, hasn't it, into the other one.
0:06:13 > 0:06:16Are you getting bored of being in The Beatles after all this time?
0:06:16 > 0:06:20No. I'm having a great time. Merry Christmas to you.
0:06:20 > 0:06:22- Long time since I've seen you. - Thank you very much, Ringo.
0:06:22 > 0:06:25- That's all right, thank you. - Are you going to work now?
0:06:25 > 0:06:27Well, I'll see what they're up to.
0:06:27 > 0:06:30I think it may be tea-time, with any luck. Bye.
0:06:30 > 0:06:33Strict radio silence was maintained.
0:06:33 > 0:06:35The public could only wait and wonder
0:06:35 > 0:06:37what the world's biggest band was up to.
0:06:39 > 0:06:41- PAUL:- Keep the bass drum loud.
0:06:41 > 0:06:44Keep the bass drum loud. Ba!
0:06:44 > 0:06:46- DRUMS PLAY - Yeah!
0:06:46 > 0:06:48Oh, is that what you're doing?
0:06:50 > 0:06:53Only in February '67 did The Beatles unveil
0:06:53 > 0:06:56the extraordinary sound world they'd been creating.
0:06:56 > 0:07:00Two of the first tracks recorded for the Sgt Pepper project
0:07:00 > 0:07:03were released - Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane.
0:07:03 > 0:07:05- ENGINEER:- Take one.
0:07:08 > 0:07:13# Living is easy with eyes closed
0:07:13 > 0:07:17# Misunderstanding all you see... #
0:07:17 > 0:07:19But hang on, you might be thinking,
0:07:19 > 0:07:22neither of these two tracks is on the album.
0:07:22 > 0:07:24No, they are not, but they could have been.
0:07:25 > 0:07:28EMI and Brian Epstein, The Beatles' manager,
0:07:28 > 0:07:31desperately wanted to release a new single.
0:07:31 > 0:07:34There hadn't been one for a whole seven months.
0:07:34 > 0:07:38So, in a bit of a flap, Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane
0:07:38 > 0:07:40were put out as a double A side.
0:07:40 > 0:07:43GUITAR AND VOCAL # ..tune in but it's all right
0:07:43 > 0:07:47# That is, I think it's not too bad
0:07:49 > 0:07:54# Let me take you down cos I'm going to
0:07:54 > 0:07:57# Strawberry Fields
0:07:59 > 0:08:03# Nothing is real
0:08:03 > 0:08:06# And nothing to get hung about
0:08:06 > 0:08:10# Strawberry Fields forever. #
0:08:10 > 0:08:14In so many ways, Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields Forever
0:08:14 > 0:08:18were and are essential and integral parts of the Sgt Pepper project,
0:08:18 > 0:08:21and not only musically. They also laid the groundwork
0:08:21 > 0:08:24for one of the central themes of the album - childhood.
0:08:24 > 0:08:30# Let me take you down cos I'm going to
0:08:30 > 0:08:33# Strawberry Fields
0:08:35 > 0:08:38# Nothing is real... #
0:08:38 > 0:08:39Strawberry Fields Forever
0:08:39 > 0:08:43was the first song recorded in the Sgt Pepper sessions.
0:08:43 > 0:08:46The name comes from a Salvation Army children's home
0:08:46 > 0:08:49near to where John Lennon grew up, Strawberry Field.
0:08:49 > 0:08:52The strong draws on his childhood memories
0:08:52 > 0:08:54of its annual garden parties,
0:08:54 > 0:08:57complete with Salvation Army band,
0:08:57 > 0:08:59and playing away from adult supervision
0:08:59 > 0:09:01in its overgrown grounds.
0:09:01 > 0:09:04These are its original iron gates.
0:09:04 > 0:09:10# It doesn't matter much to me
0:09:10 > 0:09:13# Let me take you down... #
0:09:13 > 0:09:16Nothing, absolutely nothing, could have prepared the world
0:09:16 > 0:09:20for the unique masterpiece that was Strawberry Fields Forever.
0:09:20 > 0:09:24Its daring, its bizarre soundscape, its unorthodox structure,
0:09:24 > 0:09:28and its stylistic originality still astonish today.
0:09:28 > 0:09:31# Strawberry Fields forever... #
0:09:31 > 0:09:33Right from its haunting opening notes,
0:09:33 > 0:09:36a strange flute-y sound played by Paul
0:09:36 > 0:09:39on a then still-novel keyboard, a Mellotron,
0:09:39 > 0:09:41an early form of sampler,
0:09:41 > 0:09:44we are in uncharted musical waters.
0:09:45 > 0:09:53OPENING BARS OF STRAWBERRY FIELDS FOEVER
0:09:55 > 0:10:01# Let me take you down cos I'm going to
0:10:01 > 0:10:04# Strawberry Fields
0:10:06 > 0:10:09# Nothing is real
0:10:10 > 0:10:14# And nothing to get hung about... #
0:10:14 > 0:10:18But while the song might have hinted at the sensation of an acid trip,
0:10:18 > 0:10:22that's not what it's about. It's a song about childhood memory -
0:10:22 > 0:10:26an unsettling one, at that, bristling with insecurity.
0:10:26 > 0:10:31CHAOTIC PERCUSSION
0:10:33 > 0:10:36- JOHN:- I go crazy! I go crazy!
0:10:36 > 0:10:39PERCUSSION CONTINUES
0:10:39 > 0:10:44Strawberry Fields Forever took 55 hours of studio time to create.
0:10:44 > 0:10:47Nowadays, many of the techniques it employs are routine.
0:10:47 > 0:10:51Back then, though, they had to be painstakingly developed,
0:10:51 > 0:10:53often from scratch, by producer George Martin
0:10:53 > 0:10:55and his Abbey Road engineers.
0:10:58 > 0:11:01- GEORGE MARTIN:- Strawberry Fields Forever take seven,
0:11:01 > 0:11:04remix from four-track.
0:11:04 > 0:11:06Take six.
0:11:06 > 0:11:10A remarkable example of this ingenuity came about
0:11:10 > 0:11:12when John decided he wanted to combine
0:11:12 > 0:11:14the dreamy opening mood of one take
0:11:14 > 0:11:17with the energetic groove of another,
0:11:17 > 0:11:21the two performances having been recorded ten days apart.
0:11:22 > 0:11:25"So what?" I hear you say This is what.
0:11:25 > 0:11:28The two takes are not only made up of different instruments
0:11:28 > 0:11:32playing at different volumes, but they are in different keys,
0:11:32 > 0:11:36and, most inconveniently, performed at different speeds, too.
0:11:36 > 0:11:40Joined together, they should sound like this.
0:11:40 > 0:11:43SLOWER, LOWER PITCHED TAKE # Let me take you down, cos...
0:11:43 > 0:11:48FASTER, HIGHER PITCHED TAKE # ..I'm going to
0:11:48 > 0:11:50# Strawberry Fields. #
0:11:50 > 0:11:51Awkward.
0:11:51 > 0:11:54Nowadays, editing these two disparate sections together
0:11:54 > 0:11:57so you can't hear the join could be done on a phone app,
0:11:57 > 0:12:00never mind in a studio using computerised recording systems.
0:12:00 > 0:12:04In December 1966, it had never even been tried,
0:12:04 > 0:12:08so George Martin and his team decided to follow a hunch.
0:12:08 > 0:12:12What if they could slow down the faster take
0:12:12 > 0:12:15so it matched the other one in speed and key?
0:12:17 > 0:12:21It was a neat idea, but how could the machine be slowed down
0:12:21 > 0:12:22by a regulated amount?
0:12:22 > 0:12:25In those days, magnetic tape recorders
0:12:25 > 0:12:27didn't have a variable speed function.
0:12:27 > 0:12:30Until, that is, EMI engineer Ken Townsend
0:12:30 > 0:12:34effectively invented just such a function
0:12:34 > 0:12:36by cunningly manipulating
0:12:36 > 0:12:40the electricity supply feeding the playback machine.
0:12:40 > 0:12:43This is where the join between the two takes place.
0:12:43 > 0:12:48# ..take you down cos I'm going to
0:12:48 > 0:12:52# Strawberry Fields... #
0:12:52 > 0:12:54Awesome.
0:12:54 > 0:12:56# Nothing is real
0:12:56 > 0:13:00# And nothing to get hung about
0:13:00 > 0:13:02# Strawberry Fields forever
0:13:04 > 0:13:08# Strawberry Fields forever
0:13:08 > 0:13:12# Strawberry Fields forever... #
0:13:12 > 0:13:15Strawberry Fields Forever set the tone for Sgt Pepper,
0:13:15 > 0:13:17musically and technically,
0:13:17 > 0:13:19even if it didn't make it onto the album.
0:13:19 > 0:13:24It also helped inspire Paul's journey into the musical past -
0:13:24 > 0:13:25The Beatles' shared past.
0:13:26 > 0:13:30- PAUL, CLICKING FINGERS IN TIME: - Two, one, two, three, four.
0:13:30 > 0:13:34PIANO PLAYS "PENNY LANE"
0:13:42 > 0:13:45John and Paul met at a church fete in 1957,
0:13:45 > 0:13:48a stone's throw away from Strawberry Field,
0:13:48 > 0:13:51and started writing songs together almost straightaway.
0:13:51 > 0:13:55Their creative relationship was part collaboration, part rivalry,
0:13:55 > 0:13:59so Paul reacted to John's masterpiece by coming up with
0:13:59 > 0:14:01one of his own - Penny Lane.
0:14:01 > 0:14:05# In Penny Lane there is a barber showing photographs
0:14:05 > 0:14:08# Of every head he's had the pleasure to know
0:14:09 > 0:14:13# And all the people that come and go
0:14:13 > 0:14:17# Stop and say hello... #
0:14:17 > 0:14:20Penny Lane is a short bus ride from where Paul and John grew up.
0:14:20 > 0:14:23As teenagers they used to meet at the bus shelter
0:14:23 > 0:14:25in the middle of the roundabout mentioned in the song.
0:14:27 > 0:14:29Penny Lane is a surreal nostalgic journey
0:14:29 > 0:14:32back to the very beginnings of the Beatles story.
0:14:38 > 0:14:43MUSIC: Lucille by Little Richard
0:14:49 > 0:14:54# Lucille, won't you do your sister's will?
0:14:56 > 0:15:02# Lucille, won't you do your sister's will? #
0:15:02 > 0:15:05The Beatles grew up obsessed with 1950s rock and roll.
0:15:05 > 0:15:07Paul in particular fell in love with
0:15:07 > 0:15:10the flamboyant style of Little Richard.
0:15:10 > 0:15:13Little Richard was responsible for one particular shift
0:15:13 > 0:15:16in the rhythmic pattern that underpinned rock and roll.
0:15:16 > 0:15:22The four beats in a bar - one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four -
0:15:22 > 0:15:25were subdivided into threes, or triplets.
0:15:28 > 0:15:32Little Richard evened out those threes into twos.
0:15:32 > 0:15:36HE PLAYS TWO HITS PER BEAT
0:15:39 > 0:15:41See what I did there?
0:15:41 > 0:15:44Turning the shuffle, as it was known, into a double-time rhythm
0:15:44 > 0:15:46gave rock and roll a fresh impetus,
0:15:46 > 0:15:49and made it easier for teenagers to jive to.
0:15:49 > 0:15:53MUSIC: Lucille by Little Richard
0:16:05 > 0:16:08Paul made his own contribution to the subdividing of beats.
0:16:08 > 0:16:11He takes Little Richard's eight even beats to a bar...
0:16:14 > 0:16:16..and makes them into four even beats in the bar.
0:16:16 > 0:16:20HE PLAYS "PENNY LANE" CHORDS
0:16:25 > 0:16:27Which is a musical version, I suppose,
0:16:27 > 0:16:29of replacing jogging with walking.
0:16:32 > 0:16:37# There beneath the blue suburban skies... #
0:16:39 > 0:16:43But here's the thing. The piano in Penny Lane isn't just one piano.
0:16:43 > 0:16:47On the record, it's four. And we can follow the trail of them all
0:16:47 > 0:16:50by unpicking the track layer by layer,
0:16:50 > 0:16:53like an archaeological dig, in the original masters.
0:16:53 > 0:16:56It's a fantastic demonstration of how the Beatles put together
0:16:56 > 0:17:01their songs using the studio as part of the creative process.
0:17:01 > 0:17:05"PENNY LANE" PIANO
0:17:28 > 0:17:31With the piano engine room in place,
0:17:31 > 0:17:34more surprises were to come in the song's instrumentation.
0:17:34 > 0:17:36Here's one of them.
0:17:36 > 0:17:39HE PLAYS "PENNY LANE"
0:17:44 > 0:17:49This is a harmonium, a 19th-century foot-pumped reed organ
0:17:49 > 0:17:53originally designed for smaller churches and chapels.
0:17:53 > 0:17:57Paul uses it to add some deep, breathy sustained notes.
0:18:02 > 0:18:05Paul and John's magpie-like search for instrumental colours
0:18:05 > 0:18:09that were unusual, half-forgotten or unexpected is one of the most
0:18:09 > 0:18:12distinctive features of the Sgt Pepper project.
0:18:13 > 0:18:15Alongside classical, woodwind and brass,
0:18:15 > 0:18:20Penny Lane also gives pride of place to a so-called piccolo trumpet,
0:18:20 > 0:18:23a sound that was last fashionable in 1750.
0:18:23 > 0:18:29MUSIC: Penny Lane
0:18:29 > 0:18:33While the Penny Lane sessions were under way, Paul saw a performance
0:18:33 > 0:18:36of JS Bach's second Brandenburg Concerto on the TV.
0:18:36 > 0:18:40MUSIC: Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 by JS Bach
0:18:43 > 0:18:48He decided he wanted the baroque trumpet sound on it for Penny Lane.
0:18:48 > 0:18:51TRUMPET SOLO SECTION OF "PENNY LANE"
0:19:03 > 0:19:06When this baroque-style melody is superimposed on
0:19:06 > 0:19:10the thoroughly contemporary backing of Penny Lane, it creates,
0:19:10 > 0:19:14like so much on Sgt Pepper, a new hybrid sound -
0:19:14 > 0:19:19not a copy, not a clone, a totally new combination.
0:19:19 > 0:19:24HANDCLAPS AND BACKING VOCALS
0:19:29 > 0:19:32- JOHN:- But that'll have the backwards trumpet on that.
0:19:32 > 0:19:37- PAUL:- Forward trumpet. Oh, no, backwards, sorry.
0:19:37 > 0:19:43TRUMPETS PLAYING BACKWARDS
0:19:43 > 0:19:50HANDCLAPS AND BACKING VOCALS
0:19:54 > 0:19:57Penny Lane isn't just a nostalgic postcard
0:19:57 > 0:19:59of The Beatles' 1950s youth.
0:19:59 > 0:20:04It reaches far further back in time, to Victorian days.
0:20:04 > 0:20:09This musical time travel was to be echoed throughout Sgt Pepper.
0:20:09 > 0:20:12- ENGINEER:- For The Benefit Of Mr Kite, this is take one.
0:20:12 > 0:20:13- JOHN:- BEING For The Benefit.
0:20:16 > 0:20:17Three, four.
0:20:17 > 0:20:22TRACK PLAYS
0:20:23 > 0:20:25# For the benefit of Mr Kite
0:20:25 > 0:20:29# There will be a show tonight on trampoline
0:20:32 > 0:20:36# The Hendersons will all be there Late of Pablo Fanque's Fair
0:20:36 > 0:20:38# What a scene!
0:20:38 > 0:20:41# Over men and horses Hoops and garters
0:20:41 > 0:20:44# Lastly through a hogshead of real fire
0:20:44 > 0:20:48# In this way Mr K will challenge the world... #
0:20:50 > 0:20:55One day in January 1967, John Lennon wandered into an antique shop
0:20:55 > 0:20:58in Sevenoaks, Kent and saw a poster advertising
0:20:58 > 0:21:02a circus performance which took place in 1843.
0:21:02 > 0:21:04He bought it, but it was also a gift.
0:21:05 > 0:21:08Practically all the lyrics of Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite
0:21:08 > 0:21:10come from this flyer.
0:21:12 > 0:21:15- JOHN, NASALLY: - # For the benefit of Mr Kite
0:21:15 > 0:21:17BASS PLAYS
0:21:17 > 0:21:18Two, three, four...
0:21:19 > 0:21:21- GEORGE MARTIN:- Don't shout it out,
0:21:21 > 0:21:23- though, John, just... - Well, all right.
0:21:25 > 0:21:27You'll hear it, though, I mean, it'll be on the bass.
0:21:27 > 0:21:30Well, we'll have the massed Alberts on by then, won't we?
0:21:30 > 0:21:32Two, three, four...
0:21:32 > 0:21:34MUSIC PLAYS:
0:21:38 > 0:21:40# For the benefit of Mr Kite
0:21:40 > 0:21:44# There will be a show tonight on trampoline... #
0:21:44 > 0:21:46Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite
0:21:46 > 0:21:51is Sgt Pepper's most obvious musical tribute to a bygone era.
0:21:51 > 0:21:52Ironically, though,
0:21:52 > 0:21:56it's also one of its most technologically challenging.
0:21:56 > 0:22:00To grasp how ingenious George Martin and his team were on this song,
0:22:00 > 0:22:02we need to understand
0:22:02 > 0:22:06just how limited recording resources were in 1967.
0:22:07 > 0:22:10These days, thanks to digital recording,
0:22:10 > 0:22:13you can create as many layers of sound on top of each other
0:22:13 > 0:22:16as you like, as separate recordings all fitting together -
0:22:16 > 0:22:18hundreds, if you want.
0:22:19 > 0:22:23But all that George Martin and the Beatles had available to them
0:22:23 > 0:22:27was a princely four separate tracks on one magnetic tape.
0:22:28 > 0:22:31What they frequently did was use up
0:22:31 > 0:22:33all four tracks on tape machine number one,
0:22:33 > 0:22:36then make a mix of those four, and record it,
0:22:36 > 0:22:39or bounce, as it's known in the trade,
0:22:39 > 0:22:42onto one track of the four available on tape machine number two.
0:22:44 > 0:22:47So in Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite, for example,
0:22:47 > 0:22:50the first four tracks were used up by 1 - Paul's bass...
0:22:50 > 0:22:53BASS TRACK PLAYS
0:22:53 > 0:22:55..2 - John's guide vocal...
0:22:55 > 0:22:59# Hendersons will all be there Late of Pablo Fanque's fair
0:22:59 > 0:23:00# What a scene! #
0:23:00 > 0:23:02..3 - Ringo's drums,
0:23:02 > 0:23:05and 4 - George Martin playing a harmonium.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08HARMONIUM TRACK PLAYS
0:23:10 > 0:23:13Except for the guide vocal, which was ditched,
0:23:13 > 0:23:16these were mixed and then bounced down to one track of
0:23:16 > 0:23:20the second machine, and so the process went on.
0:23:20 > 0:23:21- JOHN:- What?
0:23:23 > 0:23:26Oh, yeah, we're all on different tracks. Yeah, yeah, all the time.
0:23:27 > 0:23:31Why don't they just all play at once, then, you might ask?
0:23:31 > 0:23:34The reason is that the song was being created layer by layer
0:23:34 > 0:23:36and some sections of it
0:23:36 > 0:23:38simply couldn't be done by live performance.
0:23:38 > 0:23:41For example, the bit where Henry the horse dances the waltz.
0:23:41 > 0:23:45# And of course Henry the horse dances the waltz
0:23:45 > 0:23:48INSTRUMENTAL SECTION
0:23:56 > 0:23:59To capture this talented animal's pirouetting star turn,
0:23:59 > 0:24:03what was needed was a way to suggest the atmosphere of
0:24:03 > 0:24:06an old-fashioned circus purely in music.
0:24:06 > 0:24:11John told George Martin he wanted to "smell the sawdust".
0:24:11 > 0:24:17OLD RECORDING OF FAIRGROUND MUSIC
0:24:17 > 0:24:22A fairground organ sound was decided on, but calliopes, or "call-I-opes"
0:24:22 > 0:24:24as they are known, aren't played from a keyboard -
0:24:24 > 0:24:28they are operated by punch cards, like a player piano.
0:24:28 > 0:24:30Instead of using one of these straight,
0:24:30 > 0:24:34George Martin gathered together as many taped recordings of them
0:24:34 > 0:24:37as he could find, and asked his assistant, Geoff Emerick,
0:24:37 > 0:24:40to chop them up into one-second fragments,
0:24:40 > 0:24:44throw them in the air, and stick the pieces together again
0:24:44 > 0:24:46in a kind of random musical patchwork quilt.
0:24:48 > 0:24:49This is the result.
0:24:49 > 0:24:53CALLIOPE COMPOSITE TRACK PLAYS
0:25:00 > 0:25:05You could describe it as an early manifestation of sound sampling,
0:25:05 > 0:25:07now ubiquitous, and it works brilliantly.
0:25:07 > 0:25:12Henry the Horse's waltz now has a strikingly surrealistic,
0:25:12 > 0:25:15archly comic tone, a wonderful kind of movie in sound,
0:25:15 > 0:25:19which an existing calliope tune could never have conjured up.
0:25:19 > 0:25:23END SECTION OF "MR KITE" PLAYS
0:25:37 > 0:25:39- PAUL:- John, sing...
0:25:39 > 0:25:40Sing those quicker:
0:25:40 > 0:25:43# Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
0:25:44 > 0:25:47- # Yellow and green. # - OK.- Anyway...
0:25:49 > 0:25:54OPENING BARS OF "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"
0:25:54 > 0:25:58JOHN: # Picture yourself in a boat on a river... #
0:25:58 > 0:26:01- JOHN CHUCKLES PAUL:- Come right in with the...
0:26:01 > 0:26:05One of the most famous of all the songs on Sgt Pepper was,
0:26:05 > 0:26:10like Being For The Benefit Of Mr Kite, also inspired by a picture.
0:26:10 > 0:26:12Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
0:26:12 > 0:26:15was a childhood drawing by John's son Julian
0:26:15 > 0:26:17about a friend of his at primary school.
0:26:17 > 0:26:23# With tangerine trees and marmalade skies... #
0:26:23 > 0:26:26But there's another little girl wandering through
0:26:26 > 0:26:28this remarkable song - Alice in Wonderland.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35Published in 1865, Lewis Carroll's surreal children's classic
0:26:35 > 0:26:36came back into vogue
0:26:36 > 0:26:39in the hallucinogenic haze of a century later.
0:26:40 > 0:26:43It was also a childhood favourite of John and Paul's.
0:26:43 > 0:26:48VOCAL TRACK PLAYS: # Towering over your head
0:26:48 > 0:26:50# Look for the girl. #
0:26:50 > 0:26:52MUSIC STOPS
0:26:52 > 0:26:55COUGHING
0:26:55 > 0:26:58Concentrate, swing it.
0:26:58 > 0:27:03OPENING BARS OF "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds"
0:27:03 > 0:27:05Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
0:27:05 > 0:27:07is not, despite its initials, about LSD.
0:27:07 > 0:27:10And what's most arresting about it anyway
0:27:10 > 0:27:13is not its, "Hey, man, that's far out," vibe.
0:27:13 > 0:27:17Like Strawberry Fields Forever, the song evokes in the music
0:27:17 > 0:27:20as well as the lyrics a child's-eye view of the world.
0:27:22 > 0:27:28# A girl with kaleidoscope eyes... #
0:27:28 > 0:27:32It's established in the nursery-style music-box opening
0:27:32 > 0:27:35with its falling chromatic scale, played by Paul.
0:27:35 > 0:27:38HE PLAYS RIGHT HAND PART OF OPENING BARS
0:27:42 > 0:27:44This sets the mood of the song -
0:27:44 > 0:27:46dreamlike, disorientating, otherworldly.
0:27:46 > 0:27:49And to keep that mood going, and constantly develop it,
0:27:49 > 0:27:54Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds takes us on a harmonic journey.
0:27:54 > 0:27:55Sometimes a harmonic progression
0:27:55 > 0:27:57just goes from one chord to another...
0:27:57 > 0:28:00HE PLAYS CHORD SEQUENCE
0:28:00 > 0:28:01..then returns home.
0:28:01 > 0:28:04But more advanced use of harmony allows these journeys
0:28:04 > 0:28:07to move to a new centre of gravity altogether.
0:28:07 > 0:28:09This is called a modulation.
0:28:09 > 0:28:12HE PLAYS MODULATED CHORD SEQUENCE
0:28:13 > 0:28:16Modulations have been the bread and butter
0:28:16 > 0:28:18of Western classical music since the 18th century,
0:28:18 > 0:28:22but they weren't much of a feature of either folk music or of pop music
0:28:22 > 0:28:24before the Beatles.
0:28:24 > 0:28:27At the heart of Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds's verse
0:28:27 > 0:28:30is an instability caused by the fact that Paul's bass line
0:28:30 > 0:28:35drifts away from the home key of A by introducing notes
0:28:35 > 0:28:38beneath the chords that don't really belong in that key.
0:28:38 > 0:28:40Without these rogue notes,
0:28:40 > 0:28:43the first phrase would sound something like this.
0:28:43 > 0:28:45HE PLAYS CHORDS WITH STANDARD STYLE BASS NOTES
0:28:45 > 0:28:48# Picture yourself on a boat on a river
0:28:48 > 0:28:52# With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
0:28:52 > 0:28:57Now let's hear it with Paul's destabilising bass notes.
0:28:57 > 0:28:59HE PLAYS CHORDS WITH NEW BASS NOTES
0:29:07 > 0:29:12# Picture yourself in a boat on a river
0:29:12 > 0:29:14# With tangerine...#
0:29:14 > 0:29:17The bass here isn't just adding a bit of intrigue to a phrase,
0:29:17 > 0:29:23it's transforming the harmonic or chordal structure of the whole song.
0:29:23 > 0:29:25# You answer quite slowly... #
0:29:25 > 0:29:28What this baseline does is undermine the key of A.
0:29:28 > 0:29:31It's saying, "Don't get comfortable here."
0:29:31 > 0:29:34A, now flaky, starts to drift,
0:29:34 > 0:29:37first to F sharp minor,
0:29:37 > 0:29:39then to D minor,
0:29:39 > 0:29:41then to a new harmonic home,
0:29:41 > 0:29:45totally alien to the starting point of A - B flat for...
0:29:45 > 0:29:49# Cellophane flowers of yellow and green. #
0:29:50 > 0:29:55# Cellophane flowers of yellow and green
0:29:55 > 0:29:59# Towering over your head
0:30:00 > 0:30:06# Look for the girl with the sun in her eyes and she's gone... #
0:30:06 > 0:30:09But we don't stay with B flat for long either,
0:30:09 > 0:30:12because another nifty modulation is soon upon us.
0:30:12 > 0:30:15We drift away from B flat
0:30:15 > 0:30:17through C, then D,
0:30:17 > 0:30:19to the chorus's key of G.
0:30:20 > 0:30:25# Lucy in the sky with diamonds
0:30:26 > 0:30:28# Lucy in the...#
0:30:28 > 0:30:29In simple terms,
0:30:29 > 0:30:33moving from one key to another can alter the mood of a piece,
0:30:33 > 0:30:35like the difference in seeing the same view
0:30:35 > 0:30:38with brown, blue or green filters.
0:30:38 > 0:30:41If you keep doing it repeatedly in a song, it creates
0:30:41 > 0:30:44an atmosphere of unpredictability. It is, if you like,
0:30:44 > 0:30:48an aural equivalent of an ever-shifting kaleidoscope,
0:30:48 > 0:30:51or a girl with kaleidoscope eyes, in fact.
0:30:52 > 0:30:56# Everyone smiles as you drift past the flowers
0:30:56 > 0:31:01# That grow so incredibly high... #
0:31:01 > 0:31:04In this period of their development, Lennon and McCartney
0:31:04 > 0:31:07were clearly loving their newly discovered wizardry of modulation.
0:31:07 > 0:31:11In fact, of the 15 tracks on Sgt Pepper, if we include
0:31:11 > 0:31:13Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane,
0:31:13 > 0:31:16a staggering 12 involve modulations.
0:31:16 > 0:31:18But they were always conjured up
0:31:18 > 0:31:21like the best magician's trick - invisibly.
0:31:23 > 0:31:27# Lucy in the sky with diamonds
0:31:28 > 0:31:30# Lucy in the sky with diamonds. #
0:31:30 > 0:31:33Another reason why Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
0:31:33 > 0:31:35has a compelling sense of strangeness
0:31:35 > 0:31:38is because we're not hearing John's voice straight.
0:31:38 > 0:31:40Actually, it was recorded
0:31:40 > 0:31:43with the tape running deliberately at a lower speed.
0:31:43 > 0:31:46So when the tapes played back at a normal speed,
0:31:46 > 0:31:50the vocal sound has a higher, brighter quality.
0:31:50 > 0:31:55# With tangerine trees and marmalade skies. #
0:31:56 > 0:32:00Mostly when a voice is raised in pitch artificially like this,
0:32:00 > 0:32:03a process later given the name "vary speed",
0:32:03 > 0:32:06its essential resonances, so-called formants,
0:32:06 > 0:32:09change too, so that the vocal quality sounds thinner,
0:32:09 > 0:32:13as the more mature parts of the voice get stripped out.
0:32:13 > 0:32:16# With tangerine trees... #
0:32:16 > 0:32:20At its most extreme, an adult voice can sound like a chipmunk.
0:32:20 > 0:32:26- HIGH-PITCHED:- # Somebody calls you You answer quite slowly... #
0:32:26 > 0:32:29But a subtle raising of the pitch makes the singer sound younger,
0:32:29 > 0:32:33and so when we're hearing the solo voices on Sgt Pepper,
0:32:33 > 0:32:35singing about childhood or the past,
0:32:35 > 0:32:38we are literally hearing younger versions of them.
0:32:40 > 0:32:45# Lucy in the sky with diamonds
0:32:45 > 0:32:47# Lucy in the sky... #
0:32:47 > 0:32:49In a subconscious way, we, the listeners,
0:32:49 > 0:32:52are being led back in time with such studio tricks.
0:32:52 > 0:32:55But going back in time didn't always mean
0:32:55 > 0:32:57indulging in untroubled nostalgia.
0:32:59 > 0:33:01Is the tempo all right, Paul?
0:33:01 > 0:33:02Take six.
0:33:05 > 0:33:06Right, here we go.
0:33:06 > 0:33:08One, two, three, two, two, three.
0:33:08 > 0:33:11INTRO TO "She's Leaving Home"
0:33:29 > 0:33:34Think of the 1960s, and a series of now-famous images comes to mind -
0:33:34 > 0:33:37Carnaby Street, Twiggy, Mary Quant,
0:33:37 > 0:33:38face paint, flowers,
0:33:38 > 0:33:41hippies in tie-dye, and so on.
0:33:41 > 0:33:44But that was the Swinging Sixties and the Summer Of Love
0:33:44 > 0:33:46for a few thousand people at most.
0:33:47 > 0:33:51For everyone else, especially outside London's West End,
0:33:51 > 0:33:53mid-'60s Britain wasn't that different
0:33:53 > 0:33:56from the post-war greyness of the 1950s.
0:34:02 > 0:34:06# Wednesday morning at five o'clock
0:34:06 > 0:34:09# As the day begins
0:34:12 > 0:34:18# Silently closing her bedroom door
0:34:18 > 0:34:22# Leaving the note that she hoped would say more
0:34:22 > 0:34:26# She goes downstairs to the kitchen
0:34:26 > 0:34:30# Clutching her handkerchief... #
0:34:30 > 0:34:32Just getting by could be bleak.
0:34:32 > 0:34:34Throughout the late '50s and early '60s,
0:34:34 > 0:34:37writers, dramatists and film-makers reflected this
0:34:37 > 0:34:39by creating intense, gritty portraits
0:34:39 > 0:34:43of contemporary working-class British life.
0:34:43 > 0:34:46She's Leaving Home is their musical equivalent.
0:34:46 > 0:34:49# We gave her most of our lives. #
0:34:49 > 0:34:52Paul was inspired to write the song by a newspaper story he read
0:34:52 > 0:34:53during the Sgt Pepper sessions.
0:34:56 > 0:34:59A young woman, aged 17 in the article, leaves home
0:34:59 > 0:35:03to seek adventure in the swinging city, and, presumably,
0:35:03 > 0:35:06sexual freedom, devastating her straight-laced parents
0:35:06 > 0:35:08in the process.
0:35:08 > 0:35:12To portray this generational conflict, She's Leaving Home
0:35:12 > 0:35:15also bucks the trend of most pop songs that preceded
0:35:15 > 0:35:18by presenting more than one character's perspective.
0:35:18 > 0:35:21There's the neutral observer, whose voice begins the story,
0:35:21 > 0:35:24narrating in the third person.
0:35:24 > 0:35:28# She goes downstairs to the kitchen
0:35:28 > 0:35:31# Clutching her handkerchief. #
0:35:31 > 0:35:34And towards the end of the song, we get a hint, too,
0:35:34 > 0:35:36of the protagonist's point of view.
0:35:36 > 0:35:41# Fun is the one thing that money can't buy... #
0:35:41 > 0:35:45But, most unusually, in the chorus the story also includes
0:35:45 > 0:35:48the point of view of the runaway's distressed parents.
0:35:48 > 0:35:52# She breaks down and cries to her husband
0:35:52 > 0:35:56# "Daddy, our baby's gone." #
0:35:57 > 0:36:01To further dramatise the parent-daughter deadlock,
0:36:01 > 0:36:04the different viewpoints are sung simultaneously,
0:36:04 > 0:36:07a technique called polyphony, meaning many voices.
0:36:07 > 0:36:10And the interplay of these melodies is known as counterpoint.
0:36:10 > 0:36:14- # She... - # We never thought of ourselves
0:36:14 > 0:36:16# Is leaving
0:36:16 > 0:36:20# Never a thought for ourselves
0:36:20 > 0:36:22# Home
0:36:22 > 0:36:26# We struggled hard all our lives to get by
0:36:26 > 0:36:27# She's leaving home... #
0:36:27 > 0:36:29Not only is this musically satisfying,
0:36:29 > 0:36:33it's also generous, and it's emotionally and politically mature.
0:36:33 > 0:36:37Sympathy is shown for the parents as well as the alienated young woman.
0:36:39 > 0:36:42Polyphony and counterpoint are musical tools that have been around
0:36:42 > 0:36:45for hundreds of years in classical music.
0:36:45 > 0:36:49But there's an even older alchemy at work in She's Leaving Home.
0:36:49 > 0:36:52If you've ever wondered why the song sounds so melancholy,
0:36:52 > 0:36:54it's not just because of the subject matter
0:36:54 > 0:36:57or its delicate harp and strings accompaniment.
0:36:57 > 0:37:00It's also because Paul's melody is modal.
0:37:00 > 0:37:04Now, long before Western music had major and minor keys,
0:37:04 > 0:37:08it had an ancient system of note families called modes.
0:37:08 > 0:37:09Here's one...
0:37:11 > 0:37:13Here's another...
0:37:14 > 0:37:16And here's another...
0:37:17 > 0:37:21African-American Blues and most of the world's traditional music
0:37:21 > 0:37:23is modal. Here's an example -
0:37:23 > 0:37:27an old English folk song called The True Lover's Farewell.
0:37:28 > 0:37:32# Oh, fare you well, I must be gone
0:37:32 > 0:37:36# And leave you for a while
0:37:36 > 0:37:39# But wherever I go, I will return
0:37:39 > 0:37:44# If I go 10,000 mile, my dear
0:37:44 > 0:37:48# If I go 10,000 mile. #
0:37:48 > 0:37:52There's a sense of sadness in its rise and fall, isn't there?
0:37:52 > 0:37:56Conjuring up the idea of an earlier, earthier form of song.
0:37:56 > 0:38:00The verse melody of She's Leaving Home belongs to one of these modes -
0:38:00 > 0:38:03the Aeolian folk mode.
0:38:03 > 0:38:09# Friday morning at nine o'clock, she is far away. #
0:38:13 > 0:38:17Now, Paul didn't sit down and think, "I'll write a modal tune today."
0:38:17 > 0:38:19It was instinctive.
0:38:19 > 0:38:22Modes are embedded in the Anglo-Celtic folk songs
0:38:22 > 0:38:23he heard growing up.
0:38:23 > 0:38:27Like the childhood images evoked in Strawberry Fields Forever,
0:38:27 > 0:38:29Penny Lane or Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds,
0:38:29 > 0:38:32the intuitive use of a folk mode in She's Leaving Home
0:38:32 > 0:38:34reaches back in time.
0:38:34 > 0:38:37In this case, making the listener feel a sense of loss.
0:38:37 > 0:38:40# Fun is the one thing that money can't buy
0:38:40 > 0:38:45# Something inside that was always denied for so many years
0:38:45 > 0:38:47# Bye-bye
0:38:51 > 0:38:55# She's leaving home
0:38:55 > 0:38:58# Bye-bye. #
0:39:05 > 0:39:06Take nine. Still rolling.
0:39:09 > 0:39:12My fucking arm's dropping off, I tell you.
0:39:12 > 0:39:15Playing Sgt Pepper for the first time, the vinyl version,
0:39:15 > 0:39:19and dropping the stylus onto the beginning of side two, you could
0:39:19 > 0:39:22have been forgiven for thinking you'd put on the wrong record.
0:39:22 > 0:39:26So far, we've been on a turn-of-the-century bandstand,
0:39:26 > 0:39:29in an Alice In Wonderland phantasmagoria,
0:39:29 > 0:39:31a slice-of-life northern drama,
0:39:31 > 0:39:33and a Victorian circus.
0:39:33 > 0:39:36Now we're transported to another continent.
0:39:39 > 0:39:40Take one.
0:39:50 > 0:39:53The Lonely Hearts Club Band's Edwardian bandstand
0:39:53 > 0:39:55has turned into an ashram.
0:39:55 > 0:39:59And instead of a brass band, we're hearing the sitar, the dilruba,
0:39:59 > 0:40:01the tambura, the swarmandal and the tabla.
0:40:26 > 0:40:30Within You Without You is the most unexpected and, as it turns out,
0:40:30 > 0:40:34most visionary of all the many surprises on the album.
0:40:34 > 0:40:36It's no great exaggeration to say that the song
0:40:36 > 0:40:39is a turning point in 20th century popular music.
0:40:41 > 0:40:45It helped set in motion what we'd now call world music.
0:40:45 > 0:40:48# We were talking
0:40:50 > 0:40:57# About the space between us all
0:40:57 > 0:41:00# And the people. #
0:41:00 > 0:41:04What's radical is not just that it uses Indian instruments.
0:41:04 > 0:41:07Sitars had been played in pop records before,
0:41:07 > 0:41:11by the Rolling Stones, for example, and indeed The Beatles themselves.
0:41:11 > 0:41:14But in those cases, the Indian instruments were there
0:41:14 > 0:41:16merely to provide an exotic sound,
0:41:16 > 0:41:19a kind of aural flavouring, like musical joss sticks.
0:41:21 > 0:41:24No, George Harrison, in this piece,
0:41:24 > 0:41:26is co-opting the fundamental principles
0:41:26 > 0:41:29of Indian music, and that is an undertaking of
0:41:29 > 0:41:31a quite different order altogether.
0:41:35 > 0:41:37# Da, da, da, da
0:41:37 > 0:41:39# Da, da, da. #
0:41:39 > 0:41:40You see, because...
0:41:40 > 0:41:45Because this mar is right into the beat.
0:41:45 > 0:41:46If it goes...
0:41:48 > 0:41:50# Long as I need, I need, I need
0:41:52 > 0:41:54# Long as I need, I need. #
0:41:54 > 0:41:58George first heard a classical Indian recording in 1965.
0:41:58 > 0:42:01It was a life-changing moment.
0:42:01 > 0:42:05A year later, he sought lessons with the man he'd heard playing -
0:42:05 > 0:42:08the great virtuoso of Indian classical music, Ravi Shankar.
0:42:08 > 0:42:11# Da, da, da, da, da, da, da
0:42:11 > 0:42:12# Da, da, da, da, da, da
0:42:16 > 0:42:18# Da, da, da, da. #
0:42:18 > 0:42:21Hinduism, with its emphasis on the snares and illusions
0:42:21 > 0:42:24of the material world, had become an important part of a new kind of
0:42:24 > 0:42:27spirituality that many in the West were seeking.
0:42:27 > 0:42:30For some, it proved a passing fad.
0:42:30 > 0:42:34For George, it became a lifelong and sincere commitment.
0:42:34 > 0:42:36And he studied not only Indian music,
0:42:36 > 0:42:38but Hindu religious philosophy.
0:42:40 > 0:42:43Remarkably, it was this that George was attempting to evoke
0:42:43 > 0:42:45in a pop album.
0:42:45 > 0:42:48Within You Without You is a heartfelt reflection on the
0:42:48 > 0:42:50state of being in the modern world.
0:42:50 > 0:42:53# When you've seen beyond yourself
0:42:53 > 0:42:57# Then you may find peace of mind
0:42:57 > 0:42:58# Is waiting there
0:43:02 > 0:43:07# And the time will come when you see we're all one
0:43:07 > 0:43:13# And life flows on within you and without you. #
0:43:13 > 0:43:16To see just how radical Within You Without You was,
0:43:16 > 0:43:19let's look at the basic building blocks of Indian music
0:43:19 > 0:43:23and how they differ significantly from the Western approach.
0:43:23 > 0:43:24Take rhythm, for example.
0:43:24 > 0:43:28In Indian music, rhythmic patterns and the way they evolve
0:43:28 > 0:43:29play a far more important role
0:43:29 > 0:43:32than how a piece of music is constructed
0:43:32 > 0:43:34than they do in Western music.
0:43:34 > 0:43:37In Western music, it's quite normal for the rhythm to loop around
0:43:37 > 0:43:39and around, unchanging throughout a piece.
0:43:39 > 0:43:41Indian music, on the other hand,
0:43:41 > 0:43:43hates staying the same for any length of time.
0:43:50 > 0:43:55Every Indian piece is built around one or more taal.
0:43:55 > 0:43:58A taal is a pre-selected rhythmic pattern that recurs
0:43:58 > 0:44:02every so often throughout the piece, a groove, you might call it.
0:44:10 > 0:44:13Taal are made up of a sequence of beats - strong and weak.
0:44:13 > 0:44:16They're then strung together in long, additive lines,
0:44:16 > 0:44:20potentially requiring huge reserves of random access memory from
0:44:20 > 0:44:23the players, since none of these long strings of numbers
0:44:23 > 0:44:25are written down.
0:44:25 > 0:44:27What's more, most of these rhythmic sequences
0:44:27 > 0:44:30change speed, or laya, during the course of the piece.
0:44:32 > 0:44:35The simple teen taal, for example - the closest relative of the
0:44:35 > 0:44:38Western four beats to the bar standard -
0:44:38 > 0:44:40is made up of four sets of four beats.
0:44:40 > 0:44:44A variant of the teen taal begins Within You Without You.
0:44:44 > 0:44:50MUSIC: Within You Without You by The Beatles
0:44:54 > 0:44:57# We were talking... #
0:44:57 > 0:45:00The taal soon becomes mischievously irregular.
0:45:00 > 0:45:04George breaks up the four plus four plus four plus four pattern
0:45:04 > 0:45:09by adding two groups of five, before turning back for the second verse.
0:45:11 > 0:45:14The second verse ends with a group of five,
0:45:14 > 0:45:15then a group of five and a half.
0:45:19 > 0:45:21Both these verses upset the listener's expectation
0:45:21 > 0:45:24of where the strong beats are meant to fall.
0:45:24 > 0:45:28These kinds of divisions, by the way, are unheard of in Indian music
0:45:28 > 0:45:29and Western pop music.
0:45:29 > 0:45:32They are entirely of George's own making.
0:45:35 > 0:45:37# We were talking... #
0:45:38 > 0:45:41Another crucial factor in the song which clearly shows it was
0:45:41 > 0:45:45designed all along to be a musical adventure in two worlds,
0:45:45 > 0:45:48East and West, is the shape of the vocal line.
0:45:50 > 0:45:52George's use of melody in Within You Without You,
0:45:52 > 0:45:56whilst choosing his notes from a modified Indian scale,
0:45:56 > 0:45:59is, in truth, closer to a Western model of making a tune,
0:45:59 > 0:46:02because there is relatively little ornamentation in it.
0:46:02 > 0:46:06This is what the song might have sounded like as interpreted
0:46:06 > 0:46:08by a classical Indian singer.
0:46:09 > 0:46:13# We were talking
0:46:18 > 0:46:21# Talking
0:46:26 > 0:46:30# Talking
0:46:34 > 0:46:38# We were talking
0:46:38 > 0:46:44# About the space between us all
0:46:44 > 0:46:47# And the people... #
0:46:49 > 0:46:51It's recognisably the same song,
0:46:51 > 0:46:53but quite different from what's on the record.
0:46:53 > 0:46:56And no wonder. Because he wasn't trained to sing in this
0:46:56 > 0:46:59highly ornamented style, and guessing perhaps that the
0:46:59 > 0:47:02Western audience wasn't quite ready to hear it yet,
0:47:02 > 0:47:05George shaped instead a more straightforward tune,
0:47:05 > 0:47:07only loosely based on an Indian scale.
0:47:10 > 0:47:13Hidden in the Abbey Road Masters is a fascinating insight into how
0:47:13 > 0:47:17he coaches his Indian musicians to combine their native techniques
0:47:17 > 0:47:20with his half-Eastern, half-Western melody.
0:47:22 > 0:47:27GEORGE SINGS WITHIN YOU WITHOUT YOU IN DIFFERENT LANGUAGE
0:47:38 > 0:47:42- INDIAN MUSICIAN:- I think I prolong too much over here. Isn't it?
0:47:42 > 0:47:45- GEORGE:- OK, shall we try from the beginning?
0:47:45 > 0:47:47Just take it, Geoff, just in case.
0:47:48 > 0:47:51Within You Without You is a hybrid in its melody
0:47:51 > 0:47:55and its architecture, an amalgam of two cultures.
0:47:55 > 0:47:57But practically everything on Sgt Pepper
0:47:57 > 0:47:59is a hybrid of some kind.
0:47:59 > 0:48:03Not least the final extraordinary track, A Day In The Life.
0:48:03 > 0:48:04In The Life Of, take one.
0:48:04 > 0:48:07Have the mic on the piano, quite low.
0:48:07 > 0:48:10Just keep it like maracas, you know.
0:48:10 > 0:48:11You know those old pianos.
0:48:24 > 0:48:27# Sugar Plum Fairy, Sugar Plum Fairy. #
0:48:36 > 0:48:40A Day In The Life's status as the emotional and artistic climax
0:48:40 > 0:48:44of Sgt Pepper almost single-handedly answers the question -
0:48:44 > 0:48:49why is this record considered by musicians to be such a landmark?
0:48:49 > 0:48:52It was written before most of the other material on the album,
0:48:52 > 0:48:56and yet it manages to prefigure some many of the project's
0:48:56 > 0:48:57overall themes.
0:48:58 > 0:49:01- JOHN:- # Well, I just had to laugh. #
0:49:03 > 0:49:07It encompasses the everyday realism of ordinary life,
0:49:07 > 0:49:10deadpan commentary intertwined with psychedelia,
0:49:10 > 0:49:13experimentation with recording technology,
0:49:13 > 0:49:14use of classical orchestration,
0:49:14 > 0:49:17modulations in key and tempo,
0:49:17 > 0:49:18use of sound effects,
0:49:18 > 0:49:20avant-garde techniques,
0:49:20 > 0:49:23and third and first-person narrative juxtaposed.
0:49:23 > 0:49:27A Day In The Life is Sgt Pepper in miniature, and then some.
0:49:31 > 0:49:34# I read the news today, oh boy. #
0:49:37 > 0:49:39The song was suggested by a newspaper article
0:49:39 > 0:49:42about the death in a car crash of a young aristocrat, a friend of
0:49:42 > 0:49:43the Beatles.
0:49:43 > 0:49:46# And though the news was rather sad. #
0:49:46 > 0:49:49And a story about a scandalous 4,000 potholes identified
0:49:49 > 0:49:51in Blackburn, Lancashire.
0:49:51 > 0:49:54Perhaps only the Beatles could have turned these fragments
0:49:54 > 0:49:57of reportage into a modern classic.
0:49:57 > 0:49:59# I saw the photograph
0:50:02 > 0:50:05# He blew his mind out in a car. #
0:50:07 > 0:50:10The song begins deceptively simply,
0:50:10 > 0:50:14but listen to Ringo's anything but simple syncopated interjections,
0:50:14 > 0:50:15played on tom-toms.
0:50:15 > 0:50:18# A crowd of people stood and stared
0:50:20 > 0:50:23# They'd seen his face before
0:50:23 > 0:50:27# Nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords. #
0:50:29 > 0:50:32In playing like this, Ringo isn't fulfilling the traditional role
0:50:32 > 0:50:35of rock or pop drummer as of 1967.
0:50:35 > 0:50:39The tom-tom fills he introduces are actually a lot more like
0:50:39 > 0:50:42the way percussion works in classical music.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45He's not laying down the pulse, he's punctuating it.
0:50:48 > 0:50:50# But I just had to... #
0:50:50 > 0:50:53This already gives us a sense of disorientation,
0:50:53 > 0:50:55of ground shifting under our feet.
0:50:57 > 0:51:02# I'd love to turn you on. #
0:51:06 > 0:51:10A Day In The Life started out not as one song, but two.
0:51:10 > 0:51:11Two very different songs.
0:51:21 > 0:51:23- PAUL:- # Woke up, fell out of bed
0:51:23 > 0:51:26# Dragged a comb across my head. #
0:51:26 > 0:51:30John came into the studio with the verse, Paul added a middle section
0:51:30 > 0:51:33from a completely different song fragment of his own.
0:51:33 > 0:51:34# I noticed I was late
0:51:35 > 0:51:38# Found my coat and grabbed my hat
0:51:38 > 0:51:40# Made the bus in seconds flat
0:51:43 > 0:51:45# Found my way upstairs and had a smoke
0:51:45 > 0:51:49# And somebody spoke and I went into a dream. #
0:51:51 > 0:51:54HE PLAYS PIANO SOLO IN A DAY IN THE LIFE
0:51:58 > 0:52:03John's matter-of-fact verse, with its laconic descending harmonies,
0:52:03 > 0:52:06is set off to superb effect by Paul's urgent piano and bass driven
0:52:06 > 0:52:08middle section.
0:52:08 > 0:52:11But what was needed now was some way of segueing between the two
0:52:11 > 0:52:13different elements.
0:52:13 > 0:52:15And what they came up with was truly remarkable
0:52:15 > 0:52:17and unprecedented in pop music.
0:52:31 > 0:52:35Both Paul and John were extremely musically curious.
0:52:35 > 0:52:39Paul, in particular, was fascinated with the experimental techniques
0:52:39 > 0:52:41being forged by avant-garde composers,
0:52:41 > 0:52:44like John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen.
0:52:44 > 0:52:48One of the most radical of them was given the grand, if contradictory,
0:52:48 > 0:52:51sounding name of aleatoric composition,
0:52:51 > 0:52:53meaning creating music by chance.
0:52:53 > 0:52:56Alea is the Latin word for dice.
0:52:58 > 0:53:01The two orchestra glissando effects heard in the song
0:53:01 > 0:53:04are created by an aleatoric method.
0:53:04 > 0:53:07Paul and George Martin do it with a 40-piece orchestra,
0:53:07 > 0:53:10telling the musicians to play the lowest note their instrument
0:53:10 > 0:53:13is capable of, and then play whatever notes they like,
0:53:13 > 0:53:17however they like, as long as they gradually raise their pitch,
0:53:17 > 0:53:20and as long as they end up on one of the three notes
0:53:20 > 0:53:21of an E major chord,
0:53:21 > 0:53:24ideally at the very top of their instrument's range.
0:53:46 > 0:53:50Nothing on Sgt Pepper, as we've seen, is quite what it seems,
0:53:50 > 0:53:53which is true of its massive last chord.
0:53:53 > 0:53:56If you play this E major chord on a piano...
0:53:56 > 0:53:58HE PLAYS LOUD CHORD
0:54:02 > 0:54:06Using its sustain pedal, its natural audibility lasts about
0:54:06 > 0:54:0940 seconds, depending on what room you're in.
0:54:09 > 0:54:11But all the time, it's dying away.
0:54:11 > 0:54:15The final chord of A Day In The Life lasts 43 seconds,
0:54:15 > 0:54:20and it is weirdly, unexpectedly alive for much of that time,
0:54:20 > 0:54:24not dying away with anything like the speed of the natural version.
0:54:24 > 0:54:26It carries on resonating.
0:54:26 > 0:54:28Have you got your loud pedal down, Mark?
0:54:28 > 0:54:31- Which one's that? - The right-hand one, far right.
0:54:32 > 0:54:33Go on.
0:54:36 > 0:54:38That's it. OK.
0:54:38 > 0:54:40If you keep that on for the start, keep it on.
0:54:40 > 0:54:41Take one.
0:54:41 > 0:54:43So how was this achieved?
0:54:43 > 0:54:46First of all, listening carefully to the original tracks,
0:54:46 > 0:54:49it's not just one keyboard playing the chord, but nine,
0:54:49 > 0:54:53seven acoustic pianos, each with a subtly different tone
0:54:53 > 0:54:57played by eight people - Paul and Ringo doubled up on one of them -
0:54:57 > 0:54:59an electric organ and a harmonium.
0:55:01 > 0:55:03One, two, three...
0:55:03 > 0:55:06THEY PLAY FINAL CHORD OF A DAY IN THE LIFE
0:55:10 > 0:55:12Take two.
0:55:12 > 0:55:16The decaying tails of all seven pianos were recorded separately.
0:55:16 > 0:55:20The mixing desk's faders could then operate like a volume pedal
0:55:20 > 0:55:24on the dying chords, subtly raising them as they faded away.
0:55:24 > 0:55:27Hence the extraordinary effect of the overall chord somehow
0:55:27 > 0:55:29remaining alive.
0:55:29 > 0:55:31FINAL CHORD OF A DAY IN THE LIFE
0:55:57 > 0:56:01That elongated chord, like so much else on Sgt Pepper,
0:56:01 > 0:56:04takes something we think is familiar and reinvents it,
0:56:04 > 0:56:07as The Beatles reinvented their image and their sound,
0:56:07 > 0:56:09in every groove of the LP.
0:56:09 > 0:56:12But this wasn't innovation for the sake of it.
0:56:17 > 0:56:21The whole project, beginning as it did with the blue suburban skies
0:56:21 > 0:56:24of John and Paul's childhoods in Liverpool,
0:56:24 > 0:56:26was the most human of endeavours.
0:56:27 > 0:56:32# Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. #
0:56:32 > 0:56:34CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
0:56:37 > 0:56:38LAUGHTER
0:56:45 > 0:56:50# We're Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
0:56:50 > 0:56:53# We hope you will enjoy the show
0:56:55 > 0:57:00# Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
0:57:00 > 0:57:03# Sit back and let the evening go. #
0:57:05 > 0:57:08The musical world was never the same again after Sgt Pepper.
0:57:08 > 0:57:12That's not to say the Beatles and many other brilliant musicians
0:57:12 > 0:57:16didn't go on to make yet more wonderful and abundant new music.
0:57:16 > 0:57:19But the rules of the game had changed forever,
0:57:19 > 0:57:22and very, very few works of art in history have that effect.
0:57:22 > 0:57:28Our musical age, where genres mix and converge and interweave freely,
0:57:28 > 0:57:30really begins with this album.
0:57:30 > 0:57:34Being for the benefit for us all, you could say.
0:57:52 > 0:57:53# I feel it, I feel it, I feel it
0:57:53 > 0:57:57# Oh, baby, now I feel it, I feel it, I feel it
0:57:57 > 0:57:58# Feeling free now
0:57:58 > 0:58:00# Gotta be free now
0:58:02 > 0:58:03# Gotta be free now. #
0:58:06 > 0:58:09I think it'll probably be another day singing it.
0:58:09 > 0:58:11I just heard it then, I was like, "Yeah!"
0:58:13 > 0:58:16This is take eight and it's the choir for the end.
0:58:16 > 0:58:17Choir?
0:58:17 > 0:58:19Eight, OK.
0:58:19 > 0:58:20Eight beats, then.
0:58:20 > 0:58:22Just like, count eight.
0:58:22 > 0:58:23As soon as you say...
0:58:23 > 0:58:25THEY ALL HUM TOGETHER
0:58:29 > 0:58:31- Come on, we'll all...- OK.
0:58:31 > 0:58:33- Follow my lead.- What's the note?
0:58:35 > 0:58:38THEY ALL HUM TOGETHER
0:58:38 > 0:58:41One, two, three, four.
0:58:41 > 0:58:44THEY ALL HUM TOGETHER