Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

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Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)
The Beatles
publication December 5, 1965
length 2 min 4 s
Genre (s) pop
Author (s) Lennon / McCartney
Label Parlophone
album Rubber Soul

Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) is a song by the British band The Beatles from 1965. It was mostly written by John Lennon , but is under the Author information Lennon / McCartney . The distinctive feature of the song is the Indian instrument sitar and three- four time played by George Harrison .

background

John Lennon wrote Norwegian Wood while on a ski vacation in St. Moritz ( Switzerland ) with his first wife, Cynthia, and Beatles producer George Martin . In terms of content, the song describes an evening with a woman. Late in the evening he retires to the bathroom, where he sleeps. The next morning the woman disappeared.

In later years Lennon reported on different versions of the composition: in 1980 he claimed the authorship of the song completely for himself, while ten years earlier he reported that Paul McCartney had written the middle section. McCartney himself claimed to have written the first two lines, which Lennon then completed on Norwegian Wood , with McCartney still helping him. For the unusual title Norwegian Wood , McCartney announced that Peter Asher - part of the pop duo Peter & Gordon and brother of McCartney's girlfriend at the time, Jane Asher - had paneled his room in Norwegian wood , as many would have done at the time , which was actually cheap Was jaw . But cheap pine isn't such a good song title.

admission

Sitar

Norwegian Wood was recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London in October 1965 . The song was produced by George Martin , assisted by Norman Smith . On October 12, 1965, the Beatles recorded a first version of Norwegian Wood (still under the working title This Bird Has Flown ). The song was re-recorded in four takes on October 21 .

Norwegian Wood is one of the first popular songs to use a sitar. George Harrison, who had only recently acquired a sitar, suggested playing it on the song, although he barely mastered the instrument at the time.

The British sound engineer Geoff Emerick claimed in his 2006 book You Make the Beatles that he was the first sound engineer at Norwegian Wood to record a sitar at Abbey Road Studios, although there is evidence that he did not attend the session and only a year later started working with the Beatles.

publication

On December 3, 1965, Norwegian Wood appeared on the album Rubber Soul . As a single it was not released. An early alternative version appeared in 1996 as part of the Anthology series.

Cover versions

Cover versions published u. a. Sérgio Mendes , Herbie Hancock , Count Basie , Waylon Jennings , Hank Williams Jr. , PM Dawn , Tangerine Dream , Arjen Anthony Lucassen and José Feliciano . In 1997 the British band Cornershop recorded the song in the Punjabi language .

Others

The Japanese author Haruki Murakami named his novel Noruwei no mori (English: Norwegian Wood , in German: Naoko's smile ) after this song. At the beginning of the novel, the protagonist remembers his youth by hearing the song, which initiates the narrative.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1]
  2. ^ Lewisohn, Mark (1988). The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions. Hamlyn. ISBN 0-681-03189-1 .
  3. ↑ [2]
  4. ↑ [3]