Linda Ronstadt and me visiting Paul and Linda McCartney backstage at a Wings concert.

Though we are approaching the end of our quest, we still have some important letters to explore. Quite a few great songs begin with the letter W, which is where we find ourselves.

We start with a favourite, “When I’m Sixty-Four.” This is a song that Paul McCartney wrote in his home in Liverpool, on the upright piano in the living room. He was only about fifteen at the time, looking nearly fifty years into the future. The irony of the song today, of course, is that both the composer and I look back on our sixty-fourth year with nostalgia. It occurred to me to look up what Paul was up to when he was sixty-four, and it turns out that that was the year he released “Dance Tonight,” one of his best solo singles and a really good record that did well. So Paul, as we well know, was flourishing at sixty-four and continues to do so to this day.

In the previous chapter, I wrote about vaudeville and its English cousin, the music hall. “When I’m Sixty-Four” is probably the best-known Beatles song that has this distinct music hall flavour. We should give credit to a brilliant clarinet arrangement by George Martin, beautifully written for three clarinets and skillfully capturing the vaudeville musical spirit with which Paul had already imbued the song with his melody and lyrics.

The lyrics are remarkably evocative and softly charming. Paul is such a master of melodic motifs that he is sometimes underrated as a lyricist, and these are very clever lyrics indeed. “We can rent a cottage in the Isle of Wight,” by the way, would be wishful thinking. The Isle of Wight these days is extremely expensive, and the cottage would indeed be “too dear” by far.

For those who don’t know, the Isle of Wight is an island about five miles off the southern coast of Britain—but separate in many ways and with a fascinating history. It has always been at the forefront of Britain’s defences, both against the Spanish Armada in the reign of Elizabeth I and against any potential German invasion in World War II. They also hold interesting events there of a (thankfully) nonmilitary nature, including a music festival. The most famous iteration of the Isle of Wight Festival took place in 1969. That year it attracted an audience of about 150,000 to see Bob Dylan, the Band, the Who, Free, Joe Cocker, the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, and the Moody Blues. Bob Dylan was making his first public appearance since his serious motorcycle accident—he had declined an offer to play Woodstock and took some convincing to make his “comeback” at the Isle of Wight. Apparently, it was the poetic heritage of the island—Alfred Lord Tennyson had called it home—that made the difference. And it was Dylan’s performance that provided the motivation for George, John, and Ringo (along with Keith Richards and Eric Clapton) to attend.

Before we leave “When I’m Sixty-Four,” it is worth noting that the song has been covered by a lot of different people. A cover that I had not heard until quite recently was one by Keith Moon, for the movie All This and World War II, and it is an original and interesting version. I like the way he sings it with a slightly affected posh accent, a bit like his friend Vivian Stanshall from the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. I also like the elegant orchestrated arrangement, including a bunch of marimbas and such alongside the string ensemble. And Keith was a surprisingly good singer, too. The saddest part about it is that Keith himself made it only halfway to sixty-four. He died at the age of thirty-two, which was a terrible loss. He was an amazing drummer and an extraordinarily generous and charming man.

Another miraculously creative drummer and fine singer, of course, is Ringo Starr, and we cannot ignore his exceptional performance of “With a Little Help from My Friends,” another great W song. I have discussed Ringo’s drumming on this track in the letter D, but here I would like to call attention to his vocals. Ringo sings as he speaks—plainly, without affectation or any licks or decoration—and the performance clearly comes from the heart. Though very straightforward, his singing never sounds in the least pedestrian but rather has the solidity and conviction of someone simply stating a fact—that friends are invaluable and that their support is crucial. And this was the attitude the Beatles relied upon to help hold the band together through difficult times—though in the end, those difficulties proved insurmountable.

And as expressive as Ringo is, this is a song that two other singers have particularly made their own, in very different and effective ways. The first is James Taylor, who in addition to his own songwriting genius has a remarkable talent for taking a song originally written and performed by someone else and making it sound like a total James Taylor song. He did it with “Handy Man,” “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You),” and “You’ve Got a Friend,” and that is what he does with a live version of “With a Little Help from My Friends” which he has performed from time to time ever since he first learned the song all those years ago. Listening to James’s version, you would never know that it was a rock and roll Lennon-McCartney song. You might indeed think it was his own, as he adds in those James Taylor signature guitar licks and his vocal phrasing.

And the second, of course, is Joe Cocker, who did a version of “With a Little Help from My Friends” that really brought out something new and entirely different in the song, and between his intensely soulful vocal and the astounding arrangement and production (thanks to the brilliance of Leon Russell and Denny Cordell), his recording adds greatly to one’s admiration for the song and to the joy of hearing it.

Joe Cocker performed this famous version at Woodstock, the great festival that preceded the Isle of Wight and is another W to mention, though it is a brief detour from our alphabetical Beatles tour. I was actually at Woodstock. I somehow managed to scam a ride out to the site on a helicopter, which at the time was the only way to get there because, as you may have read, all the traffic was stopped. The roads were closed because people were just abandoning their cars and walking, so every traffic artery was completely clogged. This whole festival was put together in a very hippyish, amateurish way, which was charming and fun, but when all these hundreds of thousands of people showed up, it was complete chaos. But I did manage to see some of it, admittedly from backstage. I was not out in the mud with the masses, which looks fun in the movie, but I am not sure how much fun it would have been in real life. I saw Richie Havens, Country Joe and the Fish, and more, and it was quite an experience.

It was also the closest I ever came to meeting Janis Joplin, whom I had seen perform at the Hollywood Bowl on another occasion. She was at Woodstock, too, but I did not see her perform there. Instead, when we got back to the motel where I had somehow managed to find a room, I was walking along the corridor, and people were sleeping everywhere—one had to walk carefully. I was stepping over a couple of people, and I looked down and saw this woman holding an empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s, and it was indeed Janis Joplin. So we never actually met, unless you count meeting while one person was unconscious, because she was lying there passed out or sleeping on the floor in the corridor, and I said to myself, “Oh, that’s Janis Joplin, how cool,” and went into my room. So that’s my Woodstock story.

Returning to the Beatles, we have talked about Paul and Ringo, so turning to George, perhaps his greatest W song was “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” a musical masterpiece and lyrically accurate in the sense that it was indeed George’s guitar doing the weeping but not actually in his hands. As many of you may know, George did not play that lead guitar part. It was played by his dear friend Eric Clapton. George was an amazing musician and created many astonishingly beautiful solos of his own but deferred to Eric on this occasion—and to good effect. This song alone should also be enough to establish George’s status as an exceptionally brilliant and imaginative songwriter in his own right.

George also wrote another cool W song that is much less well known but I really do like it. It is called “Wreck of the Hesperus.” It does not have much to do with other versions of the story. First, there was a famous poem by the great American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, published in 1842—a tragic poem about a sea captain and his daughter out in the storm, and everyone dies. All very sad. George’s song is not sad at all; he is essentially declaring that he is not the “wreck of the Hesperus” but rather “the wall of China” and “tall as the Eiffel Tower.” And he does so over a seriously rocking track which featured many of George’s world-class musician friends—excellent Keltner drums and dramatic blues licks from Clapton—as well as terrific playing and singing from George himself. Check out the great guitar lick played in octaves and mixed hard left and hard right which becomes a solo at 2:25 and continues to the end of the fade. It is also worth noting the reference in the lyrics to Big Bill Broonzy, another example of a great bluesman held in higher esteem in Britain than he has ever been in his homeland. George’s songwriting skills, arranging ability, intense vocal, and musical taste are all clearly on display.

Ringo’s solo career also features several W songs, two of them unexpected. One is “When You Wish upon a Star,” an excellent performance from a Disney-tribute album called Stay Awake, which includes a trumpet solo by the legendary Herb Alpert. The album featured artists as disparate as Bonnie Raitt, Sun Ra and his Arkestra, James Taylor, and Harry Nilsson, and was produced by my friend Hal Willner, a New York record producer of great brilliance who has done a number of equally cool “themed” albums, each with a remarkable cast of artists.

Now, I confess, I have been saving what is probably my favourite Beatles W song, one that Paul wrote when he was staying at our house. A brilliant song, a great arrangement, a very well-made record, with excellent production by George Martin: “We Can Work It Out.” In many respects this track exemplifies exactly what was so exceptional about the Beatles as a creative team. Paul wrote the verse, a positive sentiment that difficulties can be overcome, set to music in the key of D major—a thoroughly happy key—ending with a triumphant kind of mini chorus of “We can work it out, we can work it out” over two bars of alternating G and D chords. Then John wrote the bridge, which takes an ominous turn musically and lyrically. As it reminds us that “life is very short,” it slips down into B minor (the relative minor of D major, where we started) and provides a startling change of mood. And then George suggested the change to waltz time (3/4) for four bars for the “fussing and fighting my friend” section. Ringo created an ultra-solid drum groove on the basic track, and his switch to a four-to-a-bar snare part is one of the elements that makes the chorus so satisfying. John played acoustic rhythm guitar (of which he was a master), and on this occasion it was George who locked the tambourine so accurately to Ringo’s drums. Then John overdubbed the imaginative harmonium swells. A genuine group effort, a masterful record, and a huge hit—as half of a double A-side with “Day Tripper.”

Before we leave the letter W behind, one of the very important W’s in the world of the Beatles is the band Wings—by far the most successful Beatles spin-off project. And, in fact, Wings would be considered a gigantic band even if the Beatles had never existed. They had so many huge hits people forget. To begin with, probably my favourite and possibly the most famous Wings track of all is “Band on the Run,” a remarkable record and an unusual hit in many respects. In the first place, it is one of Paul’s longest singles at 5:09 and is composed of three distinct and discrete musical segments. It is also worth noting that two members of the band had already run away before recording even began! Paul had decided to make the whole album in Lagos, Nigeria, but both Henry McCullough (guitar) and Denny Seiwell (drums) quit Wings shortly before the planned departure date. So the band was reduced to its essence—just Paul, Linda, and Denny Laine. Paul reverted to playing several instruments on each track—drums, percussion, and much of the lead guitar work as well as bass. This little trio (along with their invaluable engineer, the trusty Geoff Emerick) also had to contend with the various hazards of their chosen location—technical mishaps, health scares, and even a terrifying robbery at knifepoint which involved the loss of lyrics and demos. Eventually, they decided to finish the record at AIR Studios in London. Despite all this drama, both the album as a whole and the song “Band on the Run” in particular have more than withstood the test of time and rank with the very best of Paul McCartney’s extraordinary body of work.