The four members of The Beatles were all musicians of many talents. The band didn’t just churn out hit songs at the right place and time. Each member of the group honed their craft through years of practice, live performances and studio experimentation. By the end of their decade in the sun, they were all seasoned songwriters and multi-instrumentalists.
But still, what would the Fab Four have been without their closest collaborator, the industry insider who took a chance on them in 1962, George Martin? The Beatles didn’t make it easy for Martin to sign them onto his roster at Parlophone Records, a subsidiary of EMI. In his own words, their audition was “fine”, and guitarist George Harrison made fun of Martin’s tie.
The producer went with his gut, though, and was proven right beyond his wildest imagination. Martin guided The Beatles through the recording of their initial singles ‘Love Me Do’ and ‘Please Please Me’, suggesting that the latter song be sped up to turn it into a hit. Martin’s idea worked, and he then set about putting the band’s debut album down on tape.
Incredibly, the group recorded Please Please Me, named after their first chart-topping song, in a single day, on February 11th, 1963. There was still just about time for Martin to come back nine days later and add his first instrumental contributions to Beatles songs, overdubbing two markedly different keyboard parts onto the tracks ‘Misery’ and ‘Baby It’s You’.
The first, an early attempt by John Lennon at the type of downcast ballad which would become his signature, required a descending piano embellishment in its middle eight. The second, a girl-group cover written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, needed an ungainly celesta solo to mimic the original version.
But how many songs feature Martin’s playing?
From that point on, Martin played an instrument on at least one song during the recording of every Beatles album until Let It Be, for which the band jettisoned him as part of their failed ‘Get Back’ project. The group’s producer can most commonly be heard playing the piano. Even on more experimental LPs from the second half of their recording career like Revolver and The White Album, which also include accomplished piano performances by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
All in all, Martin played on 37 individual songs within The Beatles’ body of recorded work. If he hadn’t, they’d have needed to find another instrumentalist for one-seventh of their total output—an average of two songs per album.
His final contribution to The Beatles as a musician in his own right came on August 1st, 1969, on the song ‘Because’. Martin doubled up Lennon’s guitar part with a harpsichord which can be heard prominently in the final mix for the track, giving it a baroque feel. He famously struggled to keep time during the recording, needing a helping hand from Ringo Starr, who played a metronomic placeholder on hi-hat in the background.
And so, Martin was the band’s most important session player from the very beginning of their time in the studio to their final month as a band in practical terms. His role as Beatles producer was fundamental to what they achieved. But he was indispensable to the group as a musician, too. A Fifth Beatle in more sense than one.
