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Song Of The Week - She's Leaving Home

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nimrod:
"She's Leaving Home" is a Lennon–McCartney song, released in 1967 on the Beatles album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. McCartney wrote and sang the verse and Lennon the chorus. The song was performed entirely by a small string orchestra arranged by Mike Leander, and was one of only a handful of Beatles songs in which the members did not play any instruments on the recording.

Paul McCartney:

John and I wrote 'She's Leaving Home' together. It was my inspiration. We'd seen a story in the newspaper about a young girl who'd left home and not been found, there were a lot of those at the time, and that was enough to give us a story line. So I started to get the lyrics: she slips out and leaves a note and then the parents wake up ... It was rather poignant. I like it as a song, and when I showed it to John, he added the long sustained notes, and one of the nice things about the structure of the song is that it stays on those chords endlessly. Before that period in our song-writing we would have changed chords but it stays on the C chord. It really holds you. It's a really nice little trick and I think it worked very well.

While I was showing that to John, he was doing the Greek chorus, the parents' view: 'We gave her most of our lives, we gave her everything money could buy.' I think that may have been in the runaway story, it might have been a quote from the parents. Then there's the famous little line about a man from the motor trade; people have since said that was Terry Doran, who was a friend who worked in a car showroom, but it was just fiction, like the sea captain in "Yellow Submarine", they weren't real people.

The day before McCartney wanted to work on the song's score, he learned that George Martin, who usually handled the Beatles' string arrangements, was not available. He contacted Mike Leander, who did it in Martin's place. It was the first time a Beatles song was not arranged by Martin (and the only time it was done with the Beatles' consent: Phil Spector's orchestration of Let It Be was done without McCartney's knowledge). Martin was hurt by McCartney's actions, but he produced the song and conducted the string section. The harp was played by Sheila Bromberg,

When discussing Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, composer Ned Rorem described "She's Leaving Home" as "equal to any song that Schubert ever wrote."
In April 1967, McCartney visited Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys in L.A. to preview Sgt. Pepper, playing "She's Leaving Home" on the piano for him and his wife. "We both just cried," Wilson said. "It was beautiful."

Writers, Lennon and McCartney received the 1967 Ivor Novello award for Best Song Musically and Lyrically.


Personnel

Paul McCartney - double-tracked lead vocals
John Lennon - double-tracked lead vocals
Mike Leander - string arrangement
George Martin - conductor, producer
Erich Gruenberg - violin
Derek Jacobs - violin
Trevor Williams - violin
José Luis García - violin
John Underwood - viola
Stephen Shingles - viola
Dennis Vigay - cello
Alan Dalziel - cello
Gordon Pearce - double bass
Sheila Bromberg - harp

Personnel per Ian MacDonald

Klang:

It's a real quality piece, isn't it? A great example, too, of how well Paul and John could work together. Classic.

I saw a video some time back of the harpist being interviewed on a talk show. She explained how they got the unique sound of it. Some double-tracking or echo effect or something. It was interesting. I think Ringo was on the same show. That clip must be around somewhere.

 :)

nimrod:
Ive always thought it was a perfect song in every way, musically, lyrically just perfect, masterful writing.

One of my favourites of Pepper

Normandie:

--- Quote from: Kangaroo Kev on September 19, 2014, 10:05:01 PM ---Ive always thought it was a perfect song in every way, musically, lyrically just perfect, masterful writing.


--- End quote ---

Agreed. This is a truly beautiful song. I don't listen to it that often, though, because the lyrics remind me of my own mother, who would turn everything back on to herself ("How could she treat us so thoughtlessly? How could she do this to me?"). I always feel a bit sorry for the girl. No wonder she left!

I genuinely do love this song, though. The harp is gorgeous and, as you said, Kevin, the writing is masterful.

Moogmodule:
It's a gorgeous song. I think a couple of the lyrics jar with me a little. "Fun is the one thing that money can't buy" for instance. I might be being too literal but you can definitely buy fun. Paul should  know better than anyone it's love you can't buy.

But overall it tells the story well.

And I'd liked to have heard what George Martin would have done with the backing. There's nothing particularly wrong with the Leander scoring but it seems more conventional than GM would have tried.

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