47 of The Beatles' 211 tracks employ a major flat mediant chord (bIII). Those 47 are listed below, along with exhaustive documentation of how they are approached (what chord comes immediately before it) and how they progress (what comes immediately after it): [3] 'Please Please Me' bIII: 4 approach: I x4 progress: IV x3, bVI x1 [6b] 'A Taste Of Honey' bIII: 5 approach: i x3, IV x2 progress: bVII x5 [7] 'Do You Want To Know A Secret' bIII: 1 approach: i x1 progress: bII x1 [9] 'Hold Me Tight' bIII: 4 approach: I x4 progress: I x4 [14] 'It Won't Be Long' bIII: 1 approach: I x1 progress: II x1 [20] 'Don't Bother Me' bIII: 10 approach: IV x10 progress: i x10 [35] 'Things We Said Today' bIII: 4 approach: i x4 progress: bVI x4 [48] 'Another Girl' bIII: 4 approach: Ø x2, IV x2 progress: Ø x2, V x2 [51] 'The Night Before' bIII: 4 approach: I x4 progress: I x1, IV x3 [52] 'You Like Me Too Much' bIII: 2 approach: I x2 progress: V x2 [61] 'Wait' bIII: 10 approach: Ø x6, i x4 progress: Ø x4, V x6 [71] 'Michelle' bIII: 3 approach: i x3 progress: bVI x3 [73] 'Think For Yourself' bIII: 6 approach: v x6 progress: IV x6 [74] 'The Word' bIII: 5 approach: bVII x5 progress: Ø x1, IV x4 [76] 'Girl' bIII: 5 approach: i x1, iv x4 progress: Ø x1, V x4 [84] 'Taxman' bIII: 1 approach: I x1 progress: I x1 [85] 'I'm Only Sleeping' bIII: 16 approach: iv x8, bVI x8 progress: V x4, bVI x12 [91] 'Here There And Everywhere' bIII: 1 approach: iii x1 progress: ii x1 [95] 'Penny Lane' bIII: 3 approach: Ø x3 progress: V x3 [96] 'A Day in the Life' bIII: 2 approach: bVI x2 progress: bVII x2 [97] 'Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' bIII: 2 approach: I x2 progress: IV x2 [100] 'Only A Northern Song' bIII: 5 approach: Ø x1, V x4 progress: Ø x4, IV x1 [102] 'Lovely Rita' bIII: 4 approach: bVII x4 progress: I x4 [108] 'Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (reprise)' bIII: 5 approach: I x5 progress: IV x5 [109] 'Magical Mystery Tour' bIII: 12 approach: I x12 progress: IV x12 [110] 'Baby, You're a Rich Man' bIII: 2 approach: IV x2 progress: I x2 [115] 'Your Mother Should Know' bIII: 5 approach: Ø x5 progress: V x5 [116] 'I Am the Walrus' bIII: 12 approach: I x6, II x4, IV x2 progress: II x2, IV x10 [128] 'Blackbird' bIII: 4 approach: IV x4 progress: II x2, IV x2 [129] 'Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey' bIII: 6 approach: I x3, bVII x3 progress: I x3, bVII x3 [134] 'Helter Skelter' bIII: 5 approach: I x5 progress: I x2, IV x3 [136] 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' bIII: 5 approach: bVII x5 progress: V x5 [138] 'Mother Nature's Son' bIII: 6 approach: I x6 progress: IV x6 [139] 'Yer Blues' bIII: 8 approach: I x8 progress: V x8 [142] 'Back in the USSR' bIII: 12 approach: I x4, IV x8 progress: IV x12 [143] 'Dear Prudence' bIII: 1 approach: IV x1 progress: bV x1 [144] 'Glass Onion' A MINOR: bIII: 6 approach: bvii x6 progress: bVI x3, bvii x3 [148] 'Happiness is a Warm Gun' bIII: 5 approach: I x5 progress: I x3, i x2 [150] 'Savoy Truffle' bIII: 8 approach: IV x8 progress: V x8 [154] 'The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill' bIII: 6 approach: i x6 progress: bVI x6 [167] 'I Want You (She's So Heavy)' bIII: 8 approach: i x8 progress: IV x4, bVII x4 [170] 'Something' bIII: 6 approach: IV x6 progress: V x6 [173] 'You Never Give Me Your Money' bIII: 10 approach: I x4, II x3, bVII x3 progress: V x2, bVI x3, bVII x5 [176] 'Carry that Weight' bIII: 4 approach: Ø x1, I x1, bVII x2 progress: V x2, bVI x2 [177] 'Here Comes the Sun' bIII: 6 approach: V x6 progress: bVII x6 [180] 'The End' bIII: 1 approach: II x1 progress: IV x1 [183] 'Polythene Pam' bIII: 2 approach: I x2 progress: V x2 Those 47 songs use a total of 247 major flat mediants, making it the 12th most common chord in The Beatles' catalog. Here's how those 247 bIIIs are approached: Ø: 18 instances (7.3%) in 6 songs
I: 79 instances (32.0%) in 19 songs
i: 30 instances (12.1%) in 8 songs
II: 8 instances (3.2%) in 3 songs
iii: 1 instance (0.4%) in 1 song
IV: 45 instances (18.2%) in 10 songs
iv: 12 instances (4.9%) in 2 songs
V: 10 instances (4.0%) in 2 songs
v: 6 instances in (2.4%) 1 song
bVI: 10 instances (4.0%) in 2 songs
bVII: 22 instances (8.9%) in 6 songs
bvii: 6 instances (2.4%) in 1 song
And here's how they progress: Ø: 12 instances (4.9%) in 5 songs
I: 20 instances (8.1%) in 8 songs
i: 12 instances (4.9%) in 2 songs
bII: 1 instance (0.4%) in 1 song
II: 5 instances (2.0%) in 3 songs
ii: 1 instance (0.4%) in 1 song
IV: 74 instances (30.0%) in 15 songs
bV: 1 instance (0.4%) in 1 song
V: 59 instances (23.9%) in 14 songs
bVI: 34 instances (13.8%) in 8 songs
bVII: 25 instances (10.1%) in 6 songs
bvii: 3 instances (1.2%) in 1 song
Far less common is the minor flat mediant (biii), found 22 times in 3 songs: [7] 'Do You Want To Know A Secret' biii: 15 approach: iii x15 progress: ii x15 [13e] 'Till There Was You' biii: 5 approach: iii x5 progress: ii x5 [122] 'Lady Madonna' biii: 2 approach: ii x2 progress: ii x2 And rarer still is the diminished flat mediant (biii°), used 8 times in 1 song: [28] 'If I Fell' biii°: 8 approach: iii x8 progress: ii x8 CONCLUSIONS: So what do all these numbers means, and who really cares? My entire career is designed to answer one fundamental question: Why were The Beatles so great? Every presentation I deliver, every book I author, every interview I give, and every blog I write is designed to contribute to answering that inquiry. In traditional classical contexts, tonal chords function in relatively few ways: Certain chords are "required" to progress to others. But The Beatles often use chords that function in multiple ways. And the major flat mediant (by far the most commonly used variety of flat mediants) is a prime example, being approached in 12 different ways and progressing also in 12 different ways. In other words, we can better understand The Beatles' extraordinary use of harmony on a macro level by examining and understanding their use of harmony on a micro level - in this case by studying their use of flat mediant chords in great detail. The tour continues tomorrow as I head even further south.
Tuesday, 24 January 2017, 7:00-8:00 p.m. Amory Municipal Library, 401 2nd Ave N, Amory, MS The Beatles: Band of the Sixties Explore the music of The Beatles in this 60-minute multimedia presentation (part history and part musical analysis) spanning the full 1960's: beginning with the band's seminal visits to Hamburg, continuing through Beatlemania, and concluding with Abbey Road. The program will be supplemented with audio clips of music and excerpts from interviews with the band members. For the record, I won't be discussing flat mediant chords at all!
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Yesterday during "Songs The Beatles Gave Away" at the Cape Girardeau, MO library, I discussed the song 'I Call Your Name', a John Lennon song given to Billy J Kramer to record in 1963 and resurrected by The Beatles in 1964. A man in the audience pointed out that The Mamas and The Papas also released the song on their 196 debut album If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears - something I was unaware of until he mentioned it. Searching YouTube, I was able to find the recording in question. I proceed south to Mississippi tomorrow to deliver one of my favorite programs in an appropriate geographical location (Bruce is near Tupelo, where Elvis was born).
Monday, 23 January 2017, 6:00-7:30 p.m. Jesse Yancy Memorial Library, 314 North Newberger Ave, Bruce, MS The Influence of American Rock 'n' Roll on The Beatles Before the Beatles ever wrote their own songs or performed on stage, they were inspired to do so by American rock 'n' roll records. This 90-minute multimedia program will illustrate the influence of Carl Perkins, Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and other American recording artists from the 1950's on the Beatles through side-by-side comparisons and musical analysis of Beatles covers and original recordings. I stand six-foot-four, a good six inches taller than the average American male. But earlier this week during my stay in Alton, IL, the first stop on this first Beatles lecture tour of 2017, I met Robert Pershing Wadlow, the Guinness Book of World Records' tallest person in history at eight-foot-eleven. Robert was born in 1918 in Alton and died in the same city in 1940. In 1985, a life-size statue was erected in his hometown, where it remains to the present. This statue, of course, is what I met the other day. Meanwhile the tour continues tomorrow:
Sunday, 22 January 2017, 2:00-3:00 p.m. Sikeston Library, 121 E North St, Sikeston, MO The Beatles: Band of the Sixties Explore the music of The Beatles in this 60-minute multimedia presentation (part history and part musical analysis) spanning the full 1960's: beginning with the band's seminal visits to Hamburg, continuing through Beatlemania, and concluding with Abbey Road. The program will be supplemented with audio clips of music and excerpts from interviews with the band members. Today, being the 20th day of the month, is the day I send out my free email newsletter. Inspired by popular interest, I began this free monthly email newsletter in March 2014, when I sent that initial issue to 6 people. Little by little, it's grown to the point where this morning's newsletter was sent to 982 recipients. Each newsletter details my schedule for the remainder of the current month through the end of the next month - which presentation I'm giving, where, and when. Here is this month's newsletter in PDF form:
Anybody with a valid email address may register for the newsletter on my website: http://www.aaronkrerowicz.com/newsletter-sign-up.html. Just be sure to type the “prove you are human” part. (I get a lot of spam, so any submissions that skip that step are deleted.) Newsletter subscription is the best way to stay in touch. The emails are sent from my personal Gmail account, which allows recipients to respond easily and efficiently. This permits me to maintain a monthly dialog with Beatles fans across the globe. Plus, they feature adorable puppy pictures. In honor of my pooch, Abbey (as in Road), I started including a photo of her in each newsletter beginning in 2016. Here's February's, practicing her camouflage: Meanwhile, my first tour of the new year continues tomorrow at the Cape Girardeau library with the debut of a new presentation:
Saturday, 21 January 2017, 2:00-3:30 p.m. Cape Girardeau Public Library, 711 N. Clark St., Cape Girardeau, MO Songs the Beatles Gave Away In addition to writing their own music, both John Lennon and Paul McCartney also regularly penned songs for other recording artists, including Cilla Black, Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Peter and Gordon, The Rolling Stones, Badfinger, and others. This 90-minute multimedia program considers all 26 such giveaways, comparing and contrasting them to recordings actually done by the Beatles. The latest BEATLES MINUTE explores one of the band's most sophisticated recordings. I will be playing this clip as part of The History of Rock 'n' Roll, premiering Thursday 19 January 2017 at the Pickneyville Public Library in Illinois. Meanwhile, I deliver The Beatles & The Rolling Stones tomorrow in Indiana:
Tuesday, 10 January 2017, 6:30-7:30 p.m. Bartholomew County Public Library, 536 5th St, Columbus, IN The Beatles & The Rolling Stones Ask anybody to name two English rock bands from the 1960s and the response will likely be, "The Beatles and The Rolling Stones." This 60-minute multimedia presentation will compare and contrast the two through musical examples and interviews with the band members. Today, being the 20th day of the month, is the day I send out my free email newsletter. Inspired by popular interest, I began this free monthly email newsletter in March 2014, when I sent that initial issue to 6 people. Little by little, it's grown to the point where this morning's newsletter was sent to 967 recipients. Each newsletter details my schedule for the remainder of the current month through the end of the next month - which presentation I'm giving, where, and when. Here is this month's newsletter in PDF form
Anybody with a valid email address may register for the newsletter on my website: http://www.aaronkrerowicz.com/newsletter-sign-up.html. Just be sure to type the “prove you are human” part. (I get a lot of spam, so any submissions that skip that step are deleted.)
Newsletter subscription is the best way to stay in touch. The emails are sent from my personal Gmail account, which allows recipients to respond easily and efficiently. This permits me to maintain a monthly dialog with Beatles fans across the globe. Plus, they feature adorable puppy pictures. In honor of my pooch, Abbey (as in Road), I started including a photo of her in each newsletter beginning in 2016. Here's December's, with Abbey all ready for the holidays: The Rolling Stones released their latest album, Blue & Lonesome, two days ago. It consists entirely of covers of old American blues tracks, so this blog will feature the Stones' covers side-by-side with the originals. 1. "Just Your Fool" 2. "Commit a Crime" 3. "Blue and Lonesome" 4. "All of Your Love" 5. "I Gotta Go" 6. "Everybody Knows About My Good Thing" 7. "Ride 'Em On Down" 8. "Hate to See You Go" 9. "Hoo Doo Blues" 10. "Little Rain" 11. "Just Like I Treat You" 12. "I Can't Quit You Baby" About a month ago, I sat down with Larry DaSilva of Nutmeg TV in Farmington, CT for an hour-long interview about The Beatles and my most recent book, Days in the Life: A Father & Son on a Beatles Tour. The interview may be viewed in full here: http://nutmegtv.org/video-on-demand/single/?id=33939 More recently, the Journal Times in Racine, WI published an interview about the same book: http://journaltimes.com/lifestyles/relationships-and-special-occasions/father-and-son-write-book-about-beatles-tour/article_df11a9dd-11c7-5704-927f-6f3f4e665678.html My 151st and final speaking engagement of 2016 will be tomorrow:
Saturday, 3 December 2016, 1:00-2:00 p.m. South Whitley Community Public Library, 201 E Front St, South Whitley, IN The Beatles: Band of the Sixties Explore the music of The Beatles in this 60-minute multimedia presentation (part history and part musical analysis) spanning the full 1960's: beginning with the band's seminal visits to Hamburg, continuing through Beatlemania, and concluding with Abbey Road. The program will be supplemented with audio clips of music and excerpts from interviews with the band members. 'From Me To You' and 'All My Loving' share an ambiguous harmonic progression. Both use a vi resolving to I. But in between those standard chords is a very strange one. It could either be interpreted as a bVI+ or a /b6: and or and And here's what it ultimately boils down to: Is this progression three different chords (in which case the bVI+ should be used)? Or is it two different chords connected by a chromatic passing tone (in which case the /b6 should be used)? Neither is necessarily "right" or "wrong", they're just different interpretations of the same progression. Meanwhile, I wrap up the final tour of 2016 tomorrow:
Tuesday, 29 November 2016, 6:00-7:00 p.m. La Salle Public Library, 305 Marquette St, Lasalle, IL The Beatles: Band of the Sixties Explore the music of The Beatles in this 60-minute multimedia presentation (part history and part musical analysis) spanning the full 1960's: beginning with the band's seminal visits to Hamburg, continuing through Beatlemania, and concluding with Abbey Road. The program will be supplemented with audio clips of music and excerpts from interviews with the band members. Today, being the 20th day of the month, is the day I send out my newsletter. Inspired by popular interest, I began this free monthly email newsletter in March 2014, when I sent that initial issue to 6 people. Little by little, it's grown to the point where this morning's newsletter was sent to 945 recipients. Each newsletter details my schedule for the remainder of the current month through the end of the next month - which presentation I'm giving, where, and when. Here is this month's newsletter in PDF form:
Anybody with a valid email address may register for the newsletter on my website: http://www.aaronkrerowicz.com/newsletter-sign-up.html. Just be sure to type the “prove you are human” part. (I get a lot of spam, so any submissions that skip that step are deleted.) Newsletter subscription is the best way to stay in touch. The emails are sent from my personal Gmail account, which allows recipients to respond easily and efficiently. This permits me to maintain a monthly dialog with Beatles fans across the globe. Plus, they feature adorable puppy pictures. In honor of my pooch, Abbey (as in Road), I started including a photo of her in each newsletter beginning in 2016. Here's November's, in honor of the Chicago Cubs' World Series victory: The last event before Thanksgiving will take me back to Lake Zurich, Illinois, where I first spoke on June 10, 2014.
Monday, 21 November 2016, 7:00-8:00 p.m. Ela Area Public Library District, 275 Mohawk Trail, Lake Zurich, IL From the Shadow of JFK: The Rise of Beatlemania in America Many Beatles authors have cited John F. Kennedy's assassination on 22 November 1963 as a cause of the Beatles' sudden popularity in the United States in early 1964. Their logic: Kennedy's assassination made America sad, then the Beatles made America happy again. But this commonly accepted answer is overly simplistic. The real answer is that Kennedy's life and death inadvertently primed the nation for the Beatles' arrival and success. This 60-minute program will explain how and why. |
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