Flying (song) Information & Flying (song) Links at HealthHaven.com

11 tracks
	Side one "Magical Mystery Tour"; "The Fool on the Hill"; "Flying"; "Blue Jay Way"; "Your Mother Should Know"; "I Am the Walrus"; Side two "Hello, Goodbye"; "Strawberry Fields Forever"; "Penny Lane"; "Baby, You're a Rich Man"; "All You Need Is Love";

"Flying"
Instrumental by The Beatles from the album Magical Mystery Tour
Released	27 November 1967
Recorded	8 September 1967
Genre	Psychedelic rock, Space rock
Length	2:17
Label	Parlophone, Capitol, EMI
Writer	Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starr
Producer	George Martin
Magical Mystery Tour track listing
11 tracks
	Side one "Magical Mystery Tour"; "The Fool on the Hill"; "Flying"; "Blue Jay Way"; "Your Mother Should Know"; "I Am the Walrus"; Side two "Hello, Goodbye"; "Strawberry Fields Forever"; "Penny Lane"; "Baby, You're a Rich Man"; "All You Need Is Love";

For the song by Bryan Adams, see Flying (Bryan Adams song).

"Flying" is an instrumental by The Beatles which first appeared on the 1967 Magical Mystery Tour release (two EP discs in the United Kingdom, an LP in the United States).

[edit] Origins

The first since "Cry for a Shadow" in 1961, this rare Beatles instrumental (although chanting is heard at the end) was the first song to be credited as being written by all four members of the band^[1] with the writing credits of "Lennon/McCartney/Harrison/Starr" (another being "Dig It" on the Let It Be album). It was recorded on 8 September 1967 with mellotron, guitar, bass, maracas, drums, and tape loops overdubbed 28 September .

"Flying" was originally titled "Aerial Tour Instrumental". The end of the recording originally included a fast-paced traditional New Orleans jazz-influenced coda, but this was removed and replaced with an ending featuring tape loops created by John Lennon and Ringo Starr during the September 28 session. The loops initially made the song last 9 minutes 38 seconds, but the track was cut down to only 2 minutes 17 seconds. Part of the loops were used alongside an element of the ending jazz sequence to make "The Bus," an incidental piece used at various points, for the TV movie. The track is likely to have originally started simply as a jam session — it is in simple 12-bar blues form in a straight-forward 4/4 time and the key of C major.

[edit] Recording

On the track as recorded and officially released, John Lennon plays the main theme on mellotron, accompanied by Paul McCartney and George Harrison (both on guitars, plus a later bass overdub) and Ringo Starr (on maracas and drums). All four Beatles added the chanting, and the track fades in an assortment of tape effects created by Lennon and Starr. This released version is identical to that heard on the soundtrack of the Magical Mystery Tour film; the music is accompanied in the film by colour-altered images of landscape in Iceland taken from an aeroplane. Those shots are outtakes of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.^[2]

A different version can be found on some Beatles bootleg albums (such as Back-track 1), and features added Hammond organ and strange whistling noises in the early parts of the track. The jazz-influenced ending is also present on this version, which is slightly shorter, clocking in at around 2:08. This coda, which Mark Lewisohn speculated was "seemingly copied straight from an unidentifiable modern jazz record,"^[3] was in fact played on a mellotron. (In addition to the familiar samples of instruments playing single notes, mellotrons had entire banks of a pop orchestra playing popular styles of music, with optional accompaniment. The piece here was played with Dixie samples and bits of trombone accompaniment.^[4])

[edit] Cover version

In 1977, The Residents covered "Flying" on the Residents Play the Beatles side of their The Beatles Play the Residents and the Residents Play the Beatles single release. The single is now fairly difficult to obtain, although the track can be found on the discontinued CD release of The Third Reich and Roll as a bonus track, as well as the rereleased radio interview Eat Exuding Oinks.

[edit] Notes

^ Miles, Barry; Badman, Keith (2001). The Beatles Diary: The Beatles Years. Omnibus Press. p. 286. ISBN 0711983089. http://books.google.com/books?id=_TBkf1ttNBYC&pg=PA286&dq=Flying+Beatles.
^ BBC - h2g2 - 2001: A Space Odyssey
^ Lewisohn, Mark (1988). The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (First Hardback Edition). EMI. ISBN 978-0600612070.
^ Sample CD, Mike Pinder Presents Mellotron Samples

[edit] External links

Alan W. Pollack's Notes on "Flying"

[0] Miles, Barry; Badman, Keith (2001). The Beatles Diary: The Beatles Years. Omnibus Press. p. 286. ISBN 0711983089. http://books.google.com/books?id=_TBkf1ttNBYC&pg=PA286&dq=Flying+Beatles.

[1] BBC - h2g2 - 2001: A Space Odyssey

[2] Lewisohn, Mark (1988). The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (First Hardback Edition). EMI. ISBN 978-0600612070.

[3] Sample CD, Mike Pinder Presents Mellotron Samples

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Contents

[edit] Origins

[edit] Recording

[edit] Cover version

[edit] Notes

[edit] External links