How George Martin created ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’: “It sticks out like a sore thumb”
If any artist has earned the title of ‘The Fifth Beatle’, it must be George Martin. Throughout every period of the Fab Four’s career, Martin’s vast knowledge of music theory helped inform some of their greatest works, including the brilliant arrangements in songs like ‘Eleanor Rigby’. Although Martin could often translate what the group wanted to say, one task was almost too much for him to take on.
After going on a lengthy break following their retirement from the road, The Beatles ducked into Abbey Road Studios with their first new songs in years, including a new John Lennon composition called ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’. Written during his time acting in the film How I Won the War, Lennon was reminiscing about his time growing up in Liverpool, visiting this garden called Strawberry Fields as his means of escaping his trauma back home.
When laying down the original track, Martin would find it difficult to get Lennon to decide on an arrangement. While the song was originally done with a full band arrangement, Lennon cut another version with an orchestra that he thought would be far more appropriate for his artistic expression.
The only problem was that both songs had two distinctly different keys. While the band could have easily recorded the song again, Lennon liked the performances on both tracks and thought it would be great to combine them somehow, convinced Martin could make it work.
To manage both keys operating at the same time, engineer Geoff Emerick recalls them slowing down the tape of the original so that it would line up with the other version, telling The Beatles Recording Sessions: “We gradually decreased the pitch of the first version at the join to make them weld together.”
Putting the song somewhere between the keys of A and Bb, the microtonal key centre worked in the song’s favour, as if the listener is dipping into Lennon’s daydream and being taken into that dream world as the orchestra plays in the background. The tape slowed down so much that the cello on the track contains a note that can’t be played on a normal cello, hitting a low Bb at the end of every verse.
Despite the technical wizardry, Martin always had a small issue with how drastically the cut happened. Since the song is cut in the middle of a melodic phrase, Martin said he could always hear the drastic shift in tone, remarking, “That’s funny. I can hear it every time. It sticks out like a sore thumb to me.”
Regardless of the technical intricacies of the song not gelling together, Lennon was particularly pleased with the results.
Emerick recalled in Here There and Everywhere: “He listened carefully, head down deeply in concentration. I made a point of standing in front of the tape machine so that he couldn’t see the splice go by. A few seconds after the edit flew past, he lifted his head, and a grin spread across his face. He had loved what we had done with it.”
Although The Beatles may have been finished with their touring life, this was the first breakthrough in them becoming game-changers in the world of studio technology.
