What Is The Most Complex Beatles Song?

streaming what's up everyone happy Saturday uh had a great show here in Atlanta the other night the Variety Playhouse got a show coming up next month it's only two more shows this year maybe these are my two last shows I still haven't decided yet but uh at the grar C theater in New York City October 17th and in Berlin at the passion Church on October 28th going to be a fun month we're almost in October fall is here weather's starting to cool down a little bit in Atlanta I've got my Bato bundle on sale 99 bucks all four of my courses my bat book intera interactive video course they're all video courses really my uh B ear training that's a video course with a program that goes along with it that uh has hundreds of modules to train your ear my beginner guitar course if you've never played guitar before and you want to learn from scratch it starts with teaching you how to hold the guitar how to round your fingers how to mute strings how to play open chords how to play basic songs everything you need to know for that and then of course my quick lessons Pro which is more of a kind of midlevel uh maybe too advanced um I'd say mid-level to Advanced course that's based off my quick lessons I do on Instagram or on my YouTube shorts I put them on YouTube shorts as well but it breaks them down it has guitar profiles as the tablature and everything and then I have video lessons on not only what I play in them but explaining what the concepts behind that they are they're guitar lessons there but they're a little bit more for more of advanced players M intermediate to Advanced players um one of my biggest videos that I've ever done on my channel is my most complex pop song of all time you you can't believe how many people everybody I've interviewed has watched that video now I know it's got a lot of views it's 6 million 7 million I don't know how many views it's got It's got a lot of views and it was a song never going to let you go and it has 22 modulations in it if you haven't watch the video you should definitely check it out most complex po pop song of all time matter of fact Sergio Mendes song but it was written by uh Cynthia wild and um Barry man great songwriters um and the I want to say it was the bass player of Sergio Mendes wrote to me after the after I told the story about trying to play this from memory on a gig after learning it for 10 minutes with my friend Smitty and just completely what a disaster it was uh the bass player wrote me and said I've been playing the song for 20 years I still use a chart but today we're going to explore what are what are the most complex Beetle songs in complexity could be rhythmic complexity harmonic complexity uh but I I like to stick with the with the harmony modulations barrowed chords things that are out of key because Harmony is something that is um uh Harmony is the ocean that Melody sets Sail on I don't know where I heard that but I thought that was a great great description of what Harmony is because you can take a melody and you can reharmonize it thousands of different ways and um and it becomes a completely different thing because of the relationships between the chords that you're playing in the melody note for example if I play this note I play that chord um that d That's a d chord so that not's the third but if I play it [Music] here it gives it a completely different flavor if I go becomes a major 7eventh of this it's the sharp four of this chord uh it's the um if it's uh could be the sharp five of this chord for example right so that one note F sharp can can be there's hundreds of chords that that could be so that's how how Harmony uh works with Melody to make your song More colorful so I start thinking okay what are the Beatles most complex songs and you know you you start thinking okay well one of the songs I always come back to is um something okay that's off the Abby red record George Harrison's song right so it's um uh it starts right out um right starts on the four chord so the you don't know it's the four chord yet five1 right this could really be could be the five chord to the four chord in B flat major to G major and then we're definitely in C major on the verse I mean in The Way She Moves goes to C major 7 then it goes this C7 because we're getting ready to change [Music] Keys then the Way She Moves then we go to this I don't want to leave you now you know I B out and then the [Music] chorus love that walk [Music] down beautiful [Music] right [Music] and then it goes back to um um it goes to the solo after that after the [Music] bridge so that's a pretty complex song I talked about that particular song when I did my comparison of Leed Zeppelin uh the line cliche of stero to Heaven versus the uh something which was on the radio at the same time that stairway heaven or but just before stairway Heaven because this came out on Abbey Road 1970 steroid Heaven came out in 71 and I argued that if Jimmy pagee was was influenced by anything even though this is a common thing this is called a line cliche uh if he was influenced by anything it would have been something because that was a song that it was a number one song on the radio okay so I said okay that's pretty complicated what's another one that people think of and I thought well Penny Lane a lot of people say Penny Lane oh that would be the most complicated song complex song okay so Penny Lane how does that start well that starts in B major so it's like [Music] um well let's starten I can't remember the lyrics all these songs I'm terrible with [Music] lyrics my ulation [Music] beautiful we're in B [Music] major this is the first key change that's beautiful there right when it goes the B minor 7 to a G sharp half diminish the G major 7 of course these are variations of that B minor chord you hear that B minor TR over that G major 7 then this is really the five chord in in in um in B major right so this is a flat 2 major 7 chord so there's definitely key changes that happen you can hear this first you can hear that key change when it goes to B minor right then it's like okay what's the chorus um so it's like a and L is in my ears and in my eyes there beneath the blue Suburban SK as I sit and me okay so then we have a modulation back to the key of B major so it's between b and a this song right then it goes [Music] back [Music] then at the end um it goes to my ears my eyes it modulates up a whole step but really modulates back to B from a so there is a modulation at the end of the song but we're really kind of going between the keys of B major and a major with a little for Ray into this which I would call [Music] uh if I were to say this this so we're in B this is a the parallel minor of B minor right uh so uh so we're going parallel between B major and B minor there so it's but it's not that complicated we only have a couple key changes in there but really interesting it's it's the base movement and the song and the melody make it seem like it's more complex than it is although it is very complex song uh Brad Crafton uh Rick I bought the ear training course a year ago I've learned more than four years of M of Music School than four years in music school in the 90s going to pick up the bundle and the for the book awesome um yeah you know in it's interesting I've been to some colleges over the past couple years doing some events uh some talks and um it's interesting to see kind of where ear training has gone in in in colleges I think probably make a video about this with with the Advent of things like YouTube where you have people that will show you how to play Things yourself myself included uh people can go there and learn any song pretty much anything you want to learn if you want to learn how to play a song you go to YouTube and there's somebody doing a tutorial a lot of them are wrong but a lot of them are right and a lot of them are you know really really um well done well filmed and well explained um I like I prefer if I'm if somebody if I'm going to recommend a tutorial to somebody I prefer tutorials that that teachers I don't do tutorials on my on my channel cuz there there's plenty of them out there I prefer tutorials or I like to recommend tutorials that have uh the person playing the the piece first okay and then they do the explanation after so that's just a little thing from me to you to help you when you're looking for tutorials if you're looking for something to play um um then it's um uh just look for look for those things when you're looking for tutorials don't always look for ones that have the most views uh John 2000 says uh oh thanks John I bought your bundle last year and well my hands don't move as well anymore it's been a great relearning experience nice job John I really appreciate that you know that's see um you know just getting the hands moving and playing all the time is is the best thing my Aunt Penny who passed away in 2020 um she had Ms for 50 years and one of the reasons that she was always able to keep her hand movement even when her legs were faing her is from playing the piano all the time very you know that was a a really really important thing she always told me that that was uh that that consistent playing throughout the years kept her uh hands and brain connected so she played every single day she would read music and she would play and improvise okay so uh another song let's say okay what about straw Fields Forever is that a complicated song well let's think about it um let me think about how that goes it's like [Music] um oh sorry let me take you down cuz I'm going to Strawberry Fields this is weird nothing is real very weird Melody and nothing to get hung about Strawberry Fields Forever that is so cool that's actually far more complicated already or more harmonically sophisticated than um than Penny Lane then it's like a um let's see [Music] um I love [Music] that let me take you down cuz I'm going Strawberry Fields check it out nothing is real oh lenon so good and nothing to get hung about strawberry FS forever and then they you know how they do this I love that I think Harrison plays that definitely on a strat that's a great uh that that's the first time that I learned that that's like a um a uh that's like a um it's like an Eric Johnson lick 30 years before Eric Johnson that George Harrison plays I love that beautiful Beau lot of lot of very sophisticated harmonic movement in here I mean you can say the song goes uh you goes like that or I kind of hear it like this I love that D major to D major to D diminish how did John Lennon think of these things this is amazing blows my mind I think all these guys were just trying to outdo the do themselves I don't know who wrote the song first if Penny Lane or Strawberry Fields Forever was written first or what but they were both asides in the same 45 which is ridiculous right incredibly incredibly amazing um okay so what is another song some of you might say well Blackbird look at all the harmonic movement and that uh oh man hold [Music] on lot of [Music] movement you're always waiting for this moment to be free ah and then the chorus black black bird fly black bird [Music] fly that's really pretty sophisticated right that's pretty [Music] sophisticated that's beautiful incredible voice leading E minor E flat major d D major C Shar diminish C to C minor uh G over B A7 just like Jesus right um but I love the alternating Baseline there and then the then the chorus key change right so we're we're uh essentially in the key of C here we go four chord first inversion I I call this F C over E D Minor C no no we're in F major I'm sorry so it's one to five over uh in first inversion six 5 4 I love that how it goes to A7 [Music] that's pretty complicated actually the way it flows because of the voice leading though it's um it is um it the thing about Strawberry Fields is those has those two four bars I mean this this stuff is very um that that is um really unusual that is really really harmonically sophisticated voice leading and it's interesting because it's it's sophisticated has has the same kind of thing with the with this uh like the ascending progression here in Blackbird perfect voice leading but this is voice leading in a very different way I I think in a um and then when it goes to that you [Music] know Incredible use of a diminished cord that is so so um just out there right really really creative use of of Harmony there by Lenin but to me I think the most sophisticated yeah I thought about because that has the most sophisticated harmonies probably other than the layering in paper Paperback Writer um uh because which is off ABY road which is I it's a John lenon song um is very very sophisticated but when I think about what is the song that's the most unusual I probably think of uh [Music] um uh sorry key change okay so we're in B major [Music] here B to a to A6 to g to g augmented to F to F6 e E7 then D to D7 well anytime you have two dominant chords like that E7 that's going to be the five chord in the key of E of key of A D7 is a five chord and the key of G but then it goes then it goes back to a major there right so so really this is a five dominant to four dominant to one major [Music] right instead of five dominant to four major 7 to one right really really sophisticated use of voice leading there uh Joshua thank you so much um record your own Beatles Arrangements releas them on YouTube is it a Fool's errand no you can actually do your own like you can you can't play The Beatles music on YouTube but you can do um what I'm doing where you just play covers basically right these are or this is a teaching video this would be a fair use teaching video right discussing Harmony uh and breaking down a song um okay so we're in the verse of uh of I'm the wus here see how they run like B from my gun see okay first of all this is really weird right so you got you have that all that complete um you have that complete weird intro that starts in B you think you're in B major a flat 7 major oh where are we okay we're definitely moving somewhere to G augmented [Music] I really [Music] sophisticate who does that I say how do you figure out these things right when I was a kid there were no chord books and if there were chord books they were piano books that had little chord diagrams on them and they were useless for first of all I couldn't afford them and I couldn't ask my mom I I mean I guess I could have said Mom can you buy me this piano book well we don't have a piano Rick oh no I didn't ask my mom to buy Me piano books because we never owned a piano I grew up in a house that didn't we couldn't afford a piano until I went to college so my brother John took piano lessons and I remember saying to my mom mom you get a piano right when I'm a when I go to college she's like well you know what are you gonna do so uh so the only way you could learn things were to learn them by ear or from someone else so that's how I developed my ear and you know I couldn't really I used to say to my mom I don't I'm I'm going to come back to the song just give me one second you say to my mom you know I have students that can't figure out songs by ear and she said what do you mean my mom uh was not a musician her her two of her sisters were music teachers her dad played the guitar and everything my mom knew some open court she could play Hey Joe on the guitar and would play it uh for me when I'd practice soloing my mom played G major like this I always loved it when she do that but my mom could sit down and figure out any song by ear on the piano or on the guitar she could sound out the notes she's like what do you mean they can't figure out I said mom there's I've got students that cannot figure out stuff well how do you teach them I said I teach them intervals she said what's that I said well intervals are kind of the building blocks of scales and chords my mom didn't know anything about music theory even though her two sisters were music teachers she didn't know and I and I I was explaining to her you know it's a distance between chords if you have this chord A and you hear the basic go da da a g I know it goes down a whole step right I'm hearing this and I know that one note changes in it and she'd be like yeah I hear that that you mean people can't figure that out I said a lot of people can't because they don't know what to listen for so I have to teach them for what to listen for that's why these songs just like when we just did Penny Lane knowing that that it's not or on [Music] something right or all these things with with they have Baseline we have a static chord with moving baselines or you have static C or you have [Music] chords now see this has that chromatic movement but it's way more sophisticated because John Lenin is playing is not just having a static chord with base motion he is actually changing the Harmony on each of these things as the core as the things are moving and there's a lot of halfstep motion whereas in Penny Lane we have we call that dionic motion right because you're in the key of B it's the root of B major to the seventh to the sixth to the fifth okay um so there's a difference between dionic and chromatic motion uh this is chromatic motion it's chromatic because it's moving up in half steps um so um but continue on with I Am The Walrus thank you Arthur Day in the Life is a good one but but this I think is more sophisticated so after the first two times that I'm the wus [Music] goes then here [Music] then oh amazing sharp four to to the third to the to the root to the flat seven the [Music] trone and then the [Music] bridge [Music] sitting in an English garden making for the sun [Music] um I I forgot about one part so so after it goes um [Music] um [Music] then then there's a I'm crying I'm crying I'm [Music] crying that's like an interlude in the middle of the verses and choruses of I Am The Walrus is the I'm crying part where goes the D sus for I'm crying I'm crying I'm [Music] [Applause] crying okay so after all this stuff and it goes through the bridge the ending part of this I've talked about this in my live shows that I do um they have what is called a Shepherd tone at the end which is an optical uh an auditory illusion the ending of I am the wus is a seven bar phrase that goes um it goes [Music] here [Music] sharp [Music] [Applause] five I love [Music] this it seems like the melody and the Baseline just keep the melody keeps ascending and the Baseline keeps descending and Aaron just said there are no minor chords in this song which is amazing that is true there are no minor chords in I Am The Walrus and to me this is the most sophisticated song melodically and harmonically I think of all the Beatles songs um it's um really amazing it was one of John Lennon's favorite songs I heard I've I've heard him talk about it I think it was maybe a one of the Articles from 1980 or so and and it was one of the um um it was one of his favorite songs and I think it's because it is just so uh musically interesting so beautiful really blows my mind how good of a song it is so if you want to be able to figure out these kind of things by ear you should really think about investing in your musical um education and checking them checking out my B bundle this is how I finance my channel this is how I do these interviews when I go to New York and interview Kirk Hammet when I go to you know LA and interview Thomas Newman or whoever any of these interviews I do stay anytime I travel which is a lot of the time to do these interviews um I fund everything and it's really basically from from people buying my courses or becoming a member of the Bato Club but 99 bucks you get all four my courses most people on YouTube sell their courses for you know 150 bucks for a course which is perfectly Fair uh but I want to make it affordable for people you can get all four of them and um and the description is the uh you can go to to my store description is in uh down below uh how to get there and um gig New York City gramarcy theater October 17th and in Berlin at the passion Church on October 28th hope to meet you guys there you guys are amazing really really appreciate it enjoy the rest of your weekend we talked a lot of stuff today so uh so go back and rewatch a couple times have a great great weekend take care we'll see you

Channel: Rick Beato

Views: 753,993

Keywords: Beato Ear Training, Beato Book, Rick Beato, music education, pop music, Music theory, ear training, guitar theory, Rick Beato Music, How to, Music Analysis, rock music, led zeppelin, led zeppelin stairway to heaven, Jimmy page, Peter Frampton, Eric Johnson, Guitar soloing, scales for guitar, scales for guitar solos

Id: H4w4Rfr8ji8

Length: 33min 28sec (2008 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 30 2023