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Note by Reza Ganjavi: I remember in the late 80's Alan was so
generously contributing to the usenet group: rec.music.beatles. His
"notes" were cherished by all of us Beatles fans, specially the
musicians as his analysis shed a new light on what The Beatles were
doing. The Beatles did not know music theory to any great extent, which
further testifies to their genius: they came up with songs which to our
ears and to the musicologists' minds are considered as ingenious. How
grateful I am to The Beatles who gave us so many great songs to sing,
and to our dear friend Alan for performing this historic act of
spelling out the theoretical aspect of every Beatles song and
commenting on them from the stance of a musician, a musicologist, a
listener, a fan, and a good human. Thank you Alan.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW/DOWNLOAD THE PDF OF ALL THE SONGS
Also available on: http://www.torvund.net/guitar/index.php?page=Pl_main-----------------------------------------------------------
Notes On… Series
by Alan W. Pollack
In 1989 the American musicologist Alan W. Pollack started to analyze the songs of the Beatles. He
published his first results on internet. In 1991 — after he had finished the work on 28 songs — he
bravely decided to do the whole lot of them. About ten years later, in 2000 he completed the analysis of
the official Beatles' canon, consisting of 187 songs and 25 covers.
Copyright © 1989-2001 by Alan W. Pollack. All Rights Reserved. This article may be reproduced,
retransmitted, redistributed and otherwise propagated at will, provided that this notice remains intact
and in place.
These song analyses were published on The 'Official' rec.music.beatles Home Page. In case you want
to quote these pages, please refer to the original sources. So for Pollack's remarks on “Free As A Bird”
refer to: Pollack, Alan W. (1995), Notes on “Free As A Bird”. Notes on ... Series no. 194, 1995. The
'Official' rec.music.beatles Home Page (http://www.recmusicbeatles.com).
How The Songs Are Arranged
The first 28 song analyses (1-28). Pollack started his series with a selection of songs from the
Beatles' songbook. Looking at these songs, Pollack concentrates on the central elements and
characteristics of the musical idiom of the 'Fab Four'. Next to insightful analyses, this series offers a
short course in the necessary musicological concepts.
Beatlemania (1962-1964) (29-64). In their first years as song writers and performers, the Beatles
developed their own style of popular music out of the roots of American rock 'n' roll and rhythm and
blues. Here Pollack analyses the peculiarities of these early Beatles' songs. This series of 36 pieces
includes the first singles and songs on the albums Please Please Me, With The Beatles, A Hard Days
Night, and Beatles For Sale.
Becoming artists (1965-1966) (65-103). In the middle of the sixties rock musicians began to see
themselves as artists. The Beatles stood at the front of this movement, treating their music as an artistic
expression of their emotions and a serious reflection of their feelings. As a result, growing further away
from their musical roots, the songs on the albums Help!, Rubber Soul and Revolver show a growing
independency of style.
The studio years (1967-1968) (104-160). From 1967 on the Beatles operated as a studio group. A
number of themes and techniques, Pollack writes, which appear with gathering momentum on their
earlier albums and singles now can be seen to converge and blossom fully forth during this psychedelic
musical season on albums like Sgt. Pepper's, Magical Mystery Tour, the White Album and Yellow
Submarine
Get back (1969-1970) (161-195). In their last years as a recording group the final split of the group
slowly becomes visible in the growing number of solo projects. As an antidote in January 1969 the
Beatles initiated their Get Back project at the Twickenham Film Studios in London. Some of the results
of this tribute to their roots are collected on the last albums Abbey Road and Let It Be. To his analyses
of these songs Pollack adds his views on the two original songs on the recent Anthology CD's.
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