The Beatles
Great Essence (part 4)
#book "Balloon. Aeronauts and artifacts - Boris Grebenshchikov"
George Harrison
Although the physical body of the singer and musician, Beatles guitarist George Harrison is no longer with us and his ashes are scattered somewhere over Ganga, his spirit is always with us, as well as his songs. I think I personally owe him a lot, which I appreciate in my life, George turned out to be a teacher for me. For me, his songs are filled with sunlight.
He was called a "Quiet Beatle", but sometimes he wrote songs even more fantastic than the songs of his great colleagues.
Paul McCartney brought him into the future award-winning band when George was not even fourteen years old, and the rest of the Beatles immediately began exploiting child labor with gusto. However, very soon George showed that he could do something else besides playing well-honed guitar parts.
His first songs were just wonderful and simple, but on the set of the movie "Help!" George found a sitar lying in a pile of props and became interested in an exotic stringed instrument. And it had to happen that his wife Patti took him to a lecture by some Indian guru just a few days later. There was a chain reaction, the doors to the East opened. And George's music suddenly moved into a new dimension.
As the folk song says, "being a Beatle is a big deal." Everything you do immediately becomes a part of the lives of millions of people. Every word and every note is perceived as a revelation. And that's why you can't create anything but absolute perfection. George did not disappoint.
By mixing East and West, he received an unprecedented synthesis – a new and lively path to the future.
In 1970, the Beatles went their separate ways. Each of the participants has released a solo album. But while Paul sang about flowers and sheep, John attacked Paul, and Ringo tried to reconcile them, George, who was drawn to the wisdom of the East, immediately took the bull by the horns and asked: "What is Life?" The general public appreciated the depth of the artist's search, and the triple album "All Things Must Pass" was recognized as the most successful of all post-Beatles records.
One day to George was visited by his friend and teacher Ravi Shankar and told him about the disasters of the Indian people. Sensitive George responded and immediately wrote the song "Bangladesh". But after thinking it over carefully, I decided that this was not enough. Why don't all his friends get together and play a concert, all the proceeds from which would go to this very Bangladesh? Said and done. However, at the last moment it turned out that Paul won't be there, and John refused to play without Yoko (whose singing often scared people unaccustomed to him), but this shortcoming was compensated by the participation of Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan and other wonderful people.
Concerts to help the hungry in Bangladesh were a success, and George turned out to be the godfather of all subsequent charity concerts, like Live Aid; thus proving that a musician can not only sing, but also really help people in need.
George and Ravi Shankar
Having proved this, he continued to do what he loved – playing guitar and writing songs
In my youth, every new year began in our company with the fact that, waking up on the morning of the first of January, we always put Harrison on – as if this was a guarantee that the year would go right.
Maybe that's how it turned out. Actually, there was a slightly different attitude towards music back then.
George and Derek Taylor, Apple
Moving from one apartment to another consisted mainly of transporting a tape recorder with speakers, other things, as a rule, were extremely few. The tape recorder was the heart of any home. I remember seeing someone's things on the street, put up for transportation to a new place, we were amazed at the lack of a device for playing music. It was completely incomprehensible to us, we decided that people were probably sick. You can live without clothes and without a bed, but how can you live without music?
You know, I think we were right.
And Harrison's music has always been different from all other music. George never went for banal harmonic solutions – he always has a chord or two in his songs, which you don't expect at all. But as soon as these chords are played, you realize that without them the song will turn into banality. Even John Lennon said that when he got stuck writing a new song, he always turned to To George. He would give him some unexpected harmonic twist, a strange chord, and the song would take on a face.
But this is not the main thing – you can work on a song for years, build a whole tower of Babel, and still stop the car. What George wrote and sang was always full of some kind of inner light, as if he was from another, correct, planet Earth - and his music helped us to see the right world around us.
I was lucky enough to know him a little personally, and I confirm that his love for India was true and deep, for life. George has shown not only with music, but also with his whole life that between the West and There is no abyss in the East – the whole abyss is only in our own mind. You have to be able to do this: write songs about the love of God, fashionable songs, famous songs – and such that you understand how he feels.
Sometimes I even want to quote the classics and say: "I owe all the best that is in me to George"
While still a Beatle, George bought himself a huge old house under London, in Henley-on-Thames, and retired there to live – away from the London crowd. He lived there for the rest of his life – not counting trips to another house, in Hawaii. He was very hospitable–to friends; to the rest of the world he was a hermit, an anchorite, a gardener. At home, he did gardening and music. His son Dhani says, "We are all wandering in the maze like experimental mice, and the father seemed to clearly see where he was going."
His last video was very simple: good musicians are sitting and playing an old song from the 30s. And all with such dignity and pleasure that it's just a sight to see. But then the camera cuts to George himself – and suddenly it takes your breath away: such elegant carelessness, such simplicity – you realize that you are in the presence of God.
He generally gave off the feeling that he was where none of us were, as if burned by the light of the stars.
And in this video, he has a slight smile on his face, as if both he and we, those who are watching this, are just playing at being human, but we know that this is a joke.
And you know what, I agree with him.
The continuation of the fairy tale follows.....
Part 1📌
Part 2📌
Part 3📌
7 notes
·
View notes