How "Cold Heart" was made from 4 classic Elton John songs

Elon John is back at number one again in the UK for the first time in about 20 years this time featuring du leiper but what's really interesting about his new song Cold Heart Is it's not actually a new song it's cut together from four existing Elon John records I'm actually pretty sure that El and John went nowhere near a recording studio to create this new hit single this new song cold heart is a medal of four classic alt and John songs rocket man wears the shirar sacrifice and kiss the bride last year Alton was trying to go on his new tour but it was cut short of course by the pandemic so instead he set about creating a new album but with the Restriction of not really being able to go anywhere physically but despite these limitations Alton still managed to top the charts of a new song so let's look at how Alton dualipa and producers panau managed to take four existing songs and create a new hit cold heart opens with this section sung by Alton a human when things go however as any seasoned outon John fan would recognize this is actually the verse section of elton's 1989 track [Applause] [Music] sacrifice when cold heart is using a direct sample of sacrifice Elton hasn't resung this this is his original performance from 1989 however here we are hearing it in a different harmonic context the Melody has been reharmonized rather than sacrifices original chord progression 1425 in the key of D flat major here we have a new core progression in the relative minor key of B flat minor which casts a different light onto the melody despite being the exact same notes and exact same vocal performance in fact oddly the original version of sacrifice is actually in a slightly Out Of Tune dlat major it's about 50 cents flat placing it between the keys of d flat major and C major this would have been due to the tape speed being adjusted after the recorded sacrifice which subtly changed the key Center however the version of sacrifice that we hear in cold heart has been corrected back to concert pitch has been corrected back to normal dlat major so after this opening section we then get du a leiper singing the chorus of Elton John's classic track Rocket Man and I think it's going to be a long long time to touch down brings me around again and I think it's going to be a long long time to touch down brings me around rocket man has been transposed upper minor third to match the key of sacrifice and it's also been reharmonized rather than the original one to four core progression that we get in Rocket Man here rocket man's Melody is set against the same B flat minor core progression that's looped throughout Cold Heart duala is also singing rocket man's Melody 20 BPM slow than the original to match cold heart's tempo of 116 BPM the Rocket Man section is Then followed by dualer singing this line [Music] and this is another section that Alton John fans May recognize it's actually a Melody lifted from Alton John's 1983 single kiss the bride I kiss the bride is originally in the key of C major set against a 145 core progression and is played at the faster tempo of 139 BPM so just like with rocket man here in cold heart we are hearing this excerpt of Melody in quite a different context to the original now 90% of cold heart is built from these three segments Elton singing sacrifice and duala singing Rocket Man and kiss the bride but near the end of the track we do get one more sample from elton's back catalog 3 minutes into cold heart we get this Gospel Choir enter into the mix this short choir section is actually a direct sample of the choir in elton's 1976 track where's the [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] shirah as you can hear in Cold Heart we're hearing this Choir in quite a different Cor context where's the Shira is originally in the key of E flat major so to fit it into cold heart's key of B flat minor they needed to move where the Shar down by a tone so it was in the relative major key of B flat minor d flat major and this is this super satisfying bit where the shirar is originally at 130 BPM whereas cold heart is at the slower Tempo or 116 BPM and if you vary speed whereas the Sha down from 130 BPM to 116 it also shifts the pitch the key from E flat major down to d flat major perfectly matching it to cold heart's key and Tempo in one [Music] move of course using modern studio technology we can change the tempo and keep key of a piece of music independently we can make a song faster or slower without affecting its pitch and vice versa but even today the best way to change the key and Tempo without affecting the quality and tone of the original recording is to change them together using the old schore approach of vary speed effectively changing the tape speed or at least the virtual tape speed now considering the reason cold heart is set at the tempo of 116 BPM is because of the s they used of sacrifice this is actually a really amazing coincidence that where the Shar can very speed down to fit so neatly into the same key and Tempo I imagine producers panal chose the samples for this track by going back through elton's back catalog and seeing which tracks could viably vary speed into the correct key and Tempo to match sacrifice which they had obviously chosen as the main track to build cold heart around so they must have been pretty chuffed when they found that where the shiras can actually very speed perfectly into the right key and Tempo so that's how alt and John with some help from dualipa and panal managed to spin four classic tracks into a new hit single making him the first artist to score a UK Top 10 hit in six consecutive decades this medley approach to songwriting reminds me of those stars and 45s medley used to get where they take various hits of an artist and cut them together into a medley and release it as a single and I think those are seen as quite a cheap and easy money grab taking old material and spinning it into a new product but considering the limitations and restrictions that Alton was working in last year I think medley was a pretty good solution for the fact that he wanted to create new music but he couldn't leave his house you know what they do with my old songs I just give them the tapes and say you can do whatever you like with them um and they've done this one and it's basically four songs it's um sacrifice Rocket Man kiss the bride and and a very obscure song from uh an album called Blue moves called where's the shirah so I'm I don't know what I'm going to get and I when this landed on my lap I I listened to it and I went this is fantastic it would be even better maybe if there was someone else singing The Rocket Man park because I've done that so many times um and duer agreed to do it um so it's um it's a bit a bit of serendipity really but she makes the difference on it because I think if it had just been me all the way through it wouldn't have been so special now recently I asked you guys whether you'd be interested in seeing me play some geoguesser and 71% of you said yes so I've decided to start releasing geoga videos over on my second channel so if you're interested do head over to the second Channel and be one of the very first people to subscribe it's linked in the description and as always a massive massive Thanks goes to everyone who supports me on patreon including the names you see on screen right now and Andre sence Diaga Andy Deacon Andrew and Andrew susman Austin Barrett Austin Russell Bob mckinstry Bo madell Britney Parker Cameron illa Colin Aken Chris gabal Christopher Ryan David Bennett is Hart David Rivers Donald Howard Dr Darren Wicks elen schenko Eugene Leroy FD Hodor Greg kabowski Yola Tona heish brockel Bank hernick Kutcher Hugo Miller Ivan Pang Jake Fisher J kokensparger John Dy Josh sandelin Justin Viger Mark SAA Mark zhen Max O'Keefe Melody composer Squad Melanie Sher Michael Vivien Nathan Lawrence Nathaniel Park Nick Chang Paul Middleton Paul Miller PA pail Peter duny Richard gride Roger clay Sadia Carone John Kennedy Steve Daly Steven Lazaro Tim Beaker Trisha Adams Tim Payne Victor Levy bidad flowers Vladimir kov VY whan Fairbanks and [Music] Zod

Channel: David Bennett Piano

Views: 623,622

Keywords: dua lipa, pnaw, elton john, sacrifice, shoorah, rocketman, cold heart, remix, music theory, explained, original, analysis, kiss the bride

Id: t1ihDf0OkIQ

Length: 9min 32sec (572 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 03 2021