Who was the first woman to play on a Beatles song?
The Beatles were built firmly on the foundations of John, Paul, George, and Ringo. But what did they have in common? They were four young people with a dream, all from Liverpool, all who became as massive a rock titan as the other. Oh, and they were all male.
I know, that’s very much stating the most obvious fact imaginable. But it was nevertheless true that through all the spectacle of being the biggest band in the world and being at the forefront of the British invasion, a large component of this success boiled down to the level of testosterone that coursed through their bodies. Put simply, women just weren’t the vital part of the music scene of the swinging ‘60s – and, in turn, that also meant The Beatles.
Of course, this is not to say that each of their respective partners didn’t go on to play seismic roles in the rest of their lives and careers – John Lennon and Paul McCartney went on to form bands with their own wives after the Fabs had been laid to rest – but while that original mania was still alive and well, there’s no escaping the fact that the presence of a female influence was severely lacking from the group and the way they worked.
As such, when a female did eventually join the ranks, even in some small way, it was, all rather depressingly, a pretty significant moment. The valiant woman to lead that charge was Joy Hall, a cellist who played on ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ when it was released in February 1967, closely followed by Sheila Bromberg, a harpist who played on the track ‘She’s Leaving Home’, taken from Sgt Pepper, which came out in May that same year. With Hall becoming the first woman to play on a Beatles single and Bromberg the first to play on one of their albums, they captured their own little win in the scores of feminist history.
What effect did women have on The Beatles’ music?
In a lot of ways, ‘She’s Leaving Home’ was indeed an apt song for Bromberg to leave her mark on, given that the story behind the track focused on a young woman choosing the path of her own life. Based on an article Lennon and McCartney had seen in the newspaper about a 17-year-old named Melanie Coe, who left home to make a new life with her boyfriend, the song focused on the ventures and the new lease of life she was set to take, although the real Coe did end up returning home not long after.
Similarly, ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ was also a pivotal and transitional moment for the band, at which point Hall inserted herself into the fray. With the song spearheading the first initial fumes of psychedelia, no one could have anticipated just how far that kaleidoscopic dream would spin them all, but it was fitting that a woman finally took her place as part of the historic group who created that.
Nobody is claiming that we should erase the history of The Beatles nor dilute their legacy because of the lack of female presence within their back catalogue, but it was telling that women started having an influence on their works at the point in history where feminist causes and campaigns started taking a tighter grip on society. Hall and Bromberg take the titles for those important pieces of history, and they deserve it too.
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