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Flying
Composer(s) : Lennon and McCartney
Year : 1967
Chords/Tabs: Flying
Notes on "Flying" (F)
KEY C Major
METER 4/4
FORM Intro -> Verse -> Verse -> Outro (fadeout)
GENERAL POINTS OF INTEREST
Style and Form
- Yes, we *do* have to cover this one; if for no other reasons than
it's there, and its uniqueness calls for comment, even if there is,
alas, relatively little meat on the bone.
- There's little if any proof of it in the officially recorded legacy,
but we have indisputable evidence that the very Early and Late Beatles
loved to jam; to set a simple chord progression (more often than not,
but not always a 12-bar blues frame) and improvise their instrumental
hearts out until exhausted, bored, or both.
- Look back at the 1960 Quarrymen tapes that survive: more than an
hour of innocently aimless 12-bar jam sessions plus a comparitively
well thought out 12-bar theme and variations, in the minor mode, no
less, that makes the cut on Anthology I as "Cayenne;" hmmm..., my
copy of the venerable "Quarrymen Rehearse With Stu Sutcliff (sic!)
Spring 1960" identifies a more complete mastering of the same
performance as "Thinking of Linking (INST.)," but of course we
know that's wrong :-)
- At the far end, you find the (unreleased) Get Back and Abbey Road
session tapes full of jam sessions; in the case of the former, we
have seemingly endless versions of
"Dig It" and (my favorite), an
extended version of
"Sun King's" intro on top of which is superimposed
a vamp of
"Don't Let Me Down."
In the case of the latter, we have
the unedited raw tapes of both
"Something" and
"You Never Give Me Your Money."
- In the middle, there appears to be a dearth. Okay; there's the
infamous take 7 ("We got a song and an instrumental there ...") of
"She's A Woman,"
and "12-bar Original." Anything else? Did they
somehow loose the taste for it, or did they have the humility to
just not tape it all?
- And then, there is this "Arial Tour Instrumental" curiosity; a
bit too fully coreographed to pass as a true improvisation, but
rather less fully developed than we'd expect for a composition
from our Own Sweet Boys by this point of their career. Hell; even
"Cry For A Shadow" has more fully-invested calories than this one!
Melody and Harmony
- The harmony is a straight-up 12-bar blues form of the variety where
measure 12 features a V chord instead of a sustained I from measure 11.
- The makings of a tune fill play out a phrase pattern of AA'BA over
the course of the first 8 measures, but the final 4 bars are left
vaguely without melody. It's a melodic equivalent of the Paul's
tendency with lyrics during early takes to scat sing/half-mumble
the line's he hadn't fully thought out yet.
Arrangement
- We get a thick, heavy, much processed "Mellotron Music" mix of the
period; okay. [Beatles Heresies notwithstanding, the Misery Tour,
both film and abstract aesthetic, do not thrill me. I'll be the first
one to admit it may be *my* failing, entirely, but it *is* the one that
is see when I turn out the lights.]
SECTION-BY-SECTION WALKTHROUGH
Intro
- This intro, like the two verses which follow it, is a 12-bar blues
frame. You almost could call this a third verse, though I parse it
as an intro since the tune, such as it will be, is not yet in evidence.
- The rhythm guitar uses a 4->3 appoggiatura motif for this section.
Verse
- The tune of the first one is scored for English Horn solo (oboe's cannot
play the low G at the beginning), and the second one features a choral
unison of what sounds like the whole four of them.
Outro
- The music comes to a rather abrupt halt at the end of the second verse,
but the track runs on for another ~30 seconds of mellotron noodling and
other tape noises, creating a statically etherial effect.
SOME FINAL THOUGHTS
- In spite of Lewisohn's tantalizing comments about a 9 minute plus
raw version of this track that sits on a shelf, the film soundtrack of
"Flying" is identical to what appears on the album.
- Then, of course, there's that outtake that's been available for years
containing the original New Orleans jazz-style coda that was excised
on 9/28/67 in favor of the special-effects one we're familiar with from
the official version.
- When you consider the landscape of shifting colors (prescient
shades of the _2001, Space Odyssey_ landing on Jupiter sequence)
to which "Flying" is the programmatic accompaniment in the MMT
film, it seems obvious that the official outro is the more
appropriate choice. Nonetheless, on strictly musical absurdist
grounds, I actually prefer the jazz recording.
Regards,
Alan (awp@world.std.com)
---
"As it disappears, a shower of photos come from its window." 123096#124
---
Copyright (c) 1996 by Alan W. Pollack
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