Blackbird (Beatles song)

This article is about the Beatles song. For other songs with similar titles, see Blackbird (disambiguation).

"Blackbird"
Song

"Blackbird" is a song by the Beatles from their 1968 double album The Beatles (also known as "the White Album"). The song was written and performed as a solo effort by Paul McCartney, though credited to Lennon–McCartney. McCartney has stated that the lyrics of the song were inspired by the unfortunate state of race relations in the United States in the 1960s.

Origins

Lute Suite No,. 1 – BWV 996, E Minor – V Bourrée

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Performed on a lautenwerck by Martha Goldstein

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McCartney explained on Chaos and Creation at Abbey Road, aired in 2005, that the guitar accompaniment for "Blackbird" was inspired by Johann Sebastian Bach's Bourrée in E minor, a well-known lute piece, often played on the classical guitar. As teenagers, he and George Harrison tried to learn Bourrée as a "show off" piece. The Bourrée is distinguished by melody and bass notes played simultaneously on the upper and lower strings. McCartney adapted a segment of the Bourrée (reharmonised into the original's relative major key of G) as the opening of "Blackbird", and carried the musical idea throughout the song.

The first night his future wife Linda Eastman stayed at his home, McCartney played "Blackbird" for the fans camped outside his house.

Meaning

Since composing "Blackbird" in 1968, McCartney has given differing, contradictory statements regarding both his inspiration for the song and its meaning. In one of these scenarios, he has said he was inspired by hearing the call of a blackbird one morning when the Beatles were studying Transcendental Meditation in Rishikesh, India. In another, he recalls writing it in Scotland as a response to racial tensions escalating in the United States during the spring of 1968.

In May 2002, following a show in Dallas, Texas, McCartney discussed the song with KCRW DJ Chris Douridas, saying:

I had been doing some [poetry readings] in the last year or so because I've got a poetry book out called Blackbird Singing, and when I would read "Blackbird", I would always try and think of some explanation to tell the people … So, I was doing explanations, and I actually just remembered why I'd written "Blackbird", you know, that I'd been, I was in Scotland playing on my guitar, and I remembered this whole idea of "you were only waiting for this moment to arise" was about, you know, the black people's struggle in the southern states, and I was using the symbolism of a blackbird. It's not really about a blackbird whose wings are broken, you know, it's a bit more symbolic.

Before his acoustic guitar set during the same US tour, McCartney explained that "bird" is British slang for girl, making "blackbird" a synonym for "black girl".

The lyrics have invited similarly varied interpretations – as a nature song, a message in support of the Black Power movement, or a love song. Writing in the 1990s, Ian MacDonald dismissed the idea that "Blackbird" was intended as "a metaphor for the black civil rights struggle". Noting instead the composition's romantic qualities, MacDonald said that the early-morning birdsong "translates … into a succinct metaphor for awakening on a deeper level". In his discussion of "Blackbird", author Andrew Hickey writes that McCartney only began citing the civil-rights issue as his inspiration after some commentators had raised the possibility; Hickey considers this to be an example of revisionism on McCartney's part in an effort to assign greater profundity to his lyrics.

Composition and recording

The song was recorded on 11 June 1968 at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London, with George Martin as the producer and Geoff Emerick as the audio engineer. It is a solo performance with McCartney playing a Martin D 28 acoustic guitar. The track includes recordings of a male blackbird singing in the background.

The accompaniment consists of guitar, tapping, and birdsong overdub. The tapping "has been incorrectly identified as a metronome in the past", according to engineer Geoff Emerick, who says it is actually the sound of Paul tapping his foot, which Emerick recalls as being mic'd up separately. Footage included in the bonus content on disc two of the 2009 remaster of the album shows McCartney tapping both his feet alternately while performing the song.

The mono version contains bird sounds different from the stereo recording, and was originally issued on a mono incarnation of The Beatles (it has since been issued worldwide as part of The Beatles in Mono CD box set). The song appears on Love with "Yesterday", billed as "Blackbird/Yesterday". "Blackbird" provides an introduction to "Yesterday".

Live performances

In 1973, McCartney included the song, along with the Beatles track "Michelle", as part of his acoustic medley in the television special James Paul McCartney. Starting with his 1975–76 world tour with the band Wings, McCartney has performed "Blackbird" on every one of his concert tours.

In 2009, McCartney performed this song at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, commenting prior to singing it on how it had been written in response to the 1960s Civil Rights movement, and added, "It's so great to realise so many civil rights issues have been overcome."

Personnel

• Paul McCartney – double-tracked lead vocal, acoustic guitar, tape loops, foot tapping

Cover versions

"Blackbird" is, by one count, one of the top ten most recorded covers of all time. The following artists have recorded "Blackbird" in a variety of styles:

• Alter Bridge regularly in their live shows, perform a short instrumental of the song before playing their song of the same name.
• Actor/Pop rock singer Drake Bell has performed Blackbird live on multiple occasions.
• "Blackbird" appears on the Crosby, Stills & Nash 1991 box set, having been recorded during the sessions for the album Crosby, Stills & Nash. They performed it often in concert. Their concert version appeared in 2014 on the CSNY 1974 album.
• The Dandy Warhols covered the song in July 2009 following the death of Michael Jackson, in an unintended ode to a line from the first and title track of their 2003 album Welcome to the Monkey House ("When Michael Jackson dies, we're coverin' 'Blackbird'"). The line was thought to partially reference Jackson's ownership of the Beatles' back catalogue of songs when he bought Associated Television (ATV), which had previously acquired Northern Songs, in the mid-1980s.
• Sarah Darling covered the song in 2012 for the album Let Us In: Nashville – A Tribute to Linda McCartney, and it was released as a single. Darling's version was later featured in the 200th episode of Criminal Minds.
• Neil Diamond recorded the song for his 2010 album Dreams.
• Ara Dinkjian recorded the song in Night Ark.
• The Grateful Dead covered the song twice in concert in 1988.
• Dave Grohl has played the song in concert a number of times.
• In 2010, June 2, Herbie Hancock and Corrine Bailey Rae perform "Blackbird" in the East Room of the White House as part of a concert honouring Paul McCartney with the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song. White House web site.
• Justin Hayward covered the song on his 1994 Classic Blue album.
• Dave Matthews covered the song in three performances during 2005. The third recording was released in his Weekend on the Rocks live album set. It was also played as an outro on 2005-8-20 and used in sound checks a few times prior.
• In 2001, Canadian musician Sarah McLachlan recorded a cover version of "Blackbird" for the I Am Sam movie soundtrack. It also appears on her 2008 compilation album Rarities, B-Sides and Other Stuff Volume 2.
• Bobby McFerrin published an a-cappella version on his 1984 album The Voice.
• Jazz pianist Brad Mehldau recorded what has been described as a "haunting version of the Beatles' classic" on his 1997 album The Art of the Trio Volume One.
• The Paragons featuring Rosalyn Sweat recorded a ska/rocksteady version in 1973.
• Jaco Pastorius recorded the song in 1981.
• The song is covered by Phish on the band's 1994 Halloween performance, Live Phish Volume 13, which includes the performance of the entire White Album.
• In 1972, Billy Preston recorded the song on his Music Is My Life album.
• Carly Simon recorded a version for her 2007 album Into White.
• Sylvester covered the song on his live Living Proof album in 1979.
• Evan Rachel Wood sang the song in the 2007 film Across the Universe.
• On 2011, Chris Colfer's character Kurt Hummel sang "Blackbird" for the episode "Original Song" of Glee.
• Svyatoslav Vakarchuk covered the song live in 2014.
• Alicia Keys performing the song live at her Piano & I: A One Night Only Event With Alicia Keys in 2011.

External links

• Cover versions and notes
• Lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics