The beginning of the closing sequence in Abbey Road’s long medley, ‘Golden Slumbers’ was recorded as one with ‘Carry That Weight’, and based on a poem written nearly 400 years previously.
That’s Paul, apparently from a poem he found in a book, some eighteenth-century book where he just changed the words here and there.
The song’s lyrics were taken from a ballad by the Elizabethan poet and dramatist Thomas Dekker (1570-1632). Paul McCartney saw the sheet music on the piano at his father’s home in Heswall on the Wirral.
I was playing the piano in Liverpool in my dad’s house, and my stepsister Ruth’s piano book was up on the stand. I was flicking through it and I came to ‘Golden Slumbers’. I can’t read music and I couldn’t remember the old tune, so I just started playing my own tune to it. I liked the words so I kept them, and it fitted with another bit of song I had.
Anthology
This suggests that he had written ‘Carry That Weight’ already, and is therefore likely that he composed the music for ‘Golden Slumbers’ to reflect it.
Dekker’s original text was amended slightly by McCartney. The original verse, first published in 1603 in Patient Grissil, went as follows:
Golden slumbers kiss your eyes,
Smiles awake you when you rise;
Sleep, pretty wantons, do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby,
Rock them, rock them, lullaby.Care is heavy, therefore sleep you,
You are care, and care must keep you;
Sleep, pretty wantons, do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby,
Rock them, rock them, lullaby.
McCartney sang ‘Golden Slumbers’ on 7 and 9 January 1969, during the Get Back/Let It Be sessions.
In the studio
Recording for ‘Golden Slumbers’/‘Carry That Weight’ began while John Lennon was in hospital recovering from a road accident in Scotland. George Harrison played bass guitar and Ringo Starr was on drums.
I remember trying to get a very strong vocal on it, because it was such a gentle theme, so I worked on the strength of the vocal on it, and ended up quite pleased with it.
On Wednesday 2 July 1969 the three Beatles recorded 15 takes of the songs, although most were incomplete. The eight-track tape had Starr’s drums on track one; Harrison’s bass guitar on two; McCartney’s piano on three; and a guide vocal on eight.
The best of these were 13 and 15, which were edited together the following day. Takes 1-3 from this first session, meanwhile, were released in 2019 on some formats of the 50th anniversary reissue of Abbey Road.
On 30 and 31 July McCartney recorded his lead vocals, and the orchestral arrangement was added on 15 August. More overdubs were added to ‘Carry That Weight’ on other days, but the ‘Golden Slumbers’ part was a relatively straightforward recording.
One of the great songs ever in history…
although the lovely poem was already there, the melody is amazingly marvelous, while Paul’s voice is so strong and beautiful…, the result is a great love song..
I don’t know how the original tune goes but I’d bet that Paul’s melody is prettier…
I’d bet anything. Paul is a gift. Have you listened to any covers? None come anywhere near the McCartney original. In fact I always wonder why radio stations play Elbow’s version so often, it’s a mess in comparison.
Yet they butchered their own version, probably with John being away in hospital and Spector over orchestrating and Paul getting the contrast wrong, he already had contrast in the other second part with Carry that weight. Their will be a better version if it doesn’t exit somewhere else already. Great bit of song writing though.
Phil Spector had nothing to do with Golden Slumbers or anything on Abbey Road. And John not playing here has no bearing to how the song turned out… he wasn’t the band leader/studio wizard Paul was. John didn’t contribute to Here Comes The Sun, For No One, and plenty of songs on the White Album that turned out great. On top of this, I have to point out that you’re obviously in the minority if you think Golden Slumbers is a poor recording.
By far, my favorite Beatles recording. I saw Paul’s band, right after the Wings breakup, do it in LA at the forum around ’89. Awesome. Also, check out The Analogues version. This Dutch Beatle tribute band have managed to channel the Beatles to an unbelievable level. Truly the best tribute band of any artist or band I have ever seen.
Spector had nothing to do with Abbey Road Album, Spector was involved with Let it Be Album
Abbey Road was produced by George Martin
Wonderfull, superb, outstanding song… McCartney genius shines again on this one
there is a guitar in the reprise of you never give me your money, and it’s quite bluesy so i’m pretty certin that it’s george harrison.
That’s “Carry That Weight”, not Golden Slumbers.
I don’t interpret this as a love song. I think it is one of the saddest (and most beautiful) songs I know.
The key is the the opening phrase “once there was a way to get back homeward / home”.
Going back homeward being a shift in both location and to the time associated with home. “Sing little darling do not cry and I will sing a lullaby” being the words you would have heard at home from your mother.
The smile that awakes you when you rise would have been your mother’s or other loved ones.
“Once” there was a way back to all this now implies that now there is no way back, time has moved on. His mother had died. The band was breaking up. His old friends were no longer his friends.
Its a very profound and moving invocation of the longing to immerse oneself in a lovingly remembered and less complicated past.
I find it interesting how you see this song. I see it as a good friend/wife/daughter has died. This seems more like a funeral song type. It’s what I want played at my funeral. Think about it… Once there was a way, to get back home, implying that now there isn’t. Sleep pretty darling do not cry… smiles await you when you rise, implies that she just needs to go to sleep and the pain will go away and family/friends will be there to greet. Maybe I just have a morbid way of looking at it, but its always been a sad/somber song to me. Besides, when it moves to Carry That Weight, he sings about carrying a weight for a “long time” to me there is no longer time you spend on this earth than after you die. Also he makes mention of things he never did, to me sounds regretful during this lyric. In The End he says he’s going to dream about them and the love you take is equal to the love you make, referring to the memories you made with the now deceased, are what you take with you and carry on till the end. I hope I’ve explained it well. This is one of the most interesting convos I’ve seen in a while for a great song.
Excellent interpretation, Erik! Thanks!
I just returned home from my nephew’s funeral. He was 54 and died of kidney cancer. He had this song played at his funeral. Lovely. This song will forever hold special meaning for me.
I totally agree. For me it is also very sad and nostalgic I would play it at a funeral though from that perspective Carry That Weight doesn’t work quite so well for me.
My grandpa died last month, then I heard this song. Dua Lipa’s version actually. It made me cry. Missed my grandpa. ?
WOW U hit right on, right on the head, I could not have put so eloquently as U have, your thoughts have banging around my head from the first time I heard this song but could not connect the dots, thanx
Yes, exactly! Such a beautiful, yearning lyric, melody, vocal – everything!!
Love what you wrote… my sister is hours from death and that song has been running through my head for weeks.
Charlie, I completely agree. “Once there was a way to get back homeward” is nothing short of devastating. And there’s no cure, except to soothe the child. Deeply, deeply sad.
My mom was/is a big Beatles fan. Listening to this song as a young child, probably only a few years old at the time and thinking about how sad it was back then… kind of losing the song as my music tastes changed with age, not hearing it for years except in passing glances, makes it almost traumatic for me to listen to 30+ years later. Really triggers those childhood feelings of realizing sadness.
Bloody brilliant. In my opinion, this is one of Paul’s strongest vocal performances. The bass, done by George on this, is surprisingly fitting and really hits nicely.
Aak – why would George’s bass be ‘surprisingly fitting’? Not a surprise. He was a top-notch musician at this point, working as a session man for no less than Cream, Billy Preston and many others. And Golden Slumbers is a very simple song.
By surprisingly fitting, I mean that it sounds very McCartney-ilke. I agree; Harrison was a great musician at this point and I’d expect nothing less than excellent on this performance.
Regardless, it’s a beautiful song and a lovely bass line.
There’s a funny bit on the last Anthology disc where Paul, George, and Ringo are sitting at the mixing board listening to this song. They’re wondering who played bass and Paul says something along the lines of “I think I may have played the bass.” George, looks into the camera and, with tongue-in-cheek, says (with just a bit o’ sarcasm) “he was king!”
I’d only just seen that part from Anthology where George Martin is telling the band that every take of Golden Slumbers has bass on it. George Harrison begins to say “We used to have this Fender six string bass..” and makes some high spirited wisecracks as George Martin is telling him about how all the takes of the basic track feature bass AND piano and it isn’t until this moment that there seems to be a consensus that George must have played the bass. Though it is interesting as the bass on Golden Slumbers is interesting.. it has a number of those McCartneyesque bends on it so in my mind that mystery is not solved. But still it would seem to be George.
I believe George said “He was keen”. Meaning George assumed Paul was probably impatient to lay the track down and so played both piano and bass parts himself. George Martin then concludes Paul could not have in fact have played bass on the track.
The first stanza of Dekker’s poem has been made into a lullaby (Golden Slumbers). I think it is included in a Disney lullabies album. The melody is nursery-rhyme-like, very traditional, and very beautiful. But you guys are right, it won’t make you fall asleep, but I like Paul’s version better..
One of my favourites…
I have a 1 year old daughter and I sing Golden Slumbers to her everynight when putting her down to sleep.
(Terribly difficult song to sing btw)
I do this, too! My oldest daughters (now 8 and 6) used to love when I’d sing Golden Slumbers and Good Night to them. I’m tearing up just thinking about it, those are nice memories 🙂
My daughter was born two nights ago. I played this song for her while I was holding her as she stared at me. I’ll play it for her or sing it to her each night going forward until she asks me to stop. It’s such a beautiful song, and it seems very appropriate to sing it to my baby girl.
FYI the Dekker play is actually Patient Grissil (Act 4, scene 2) from 1603, not Old Fortunatus…
…”and it fitted with another bit of song I had” – Joe suggests he’s referring to Carry That Weight here, but I think he might be referring to the “Once there was a way to get back homeward” part, which is not in the original poem.
I think its likely that Paul wrote Golden Slumbers as he would any other tune – i.e. thinking of it as a standalone piece, rather than as part of ‘the medley’. And the join between Golden Slumbers and Carry That Weight is definitely one that makes more sense as one song segueing into another – I don’t think Paul the craftsman would’ve made that join if he were crafting a single ‘song’ in the traditional sense.
I think it’s one of the most moving Beatles’s songs. God knows what it means, and I like the interp above of it being sad — yes, it’s so sad, cuz childhood comes and goes, and that door was once open, and there was a way to get back home, so to speak – to the beautiful innocence. But, like the Beatles, the past – our past – it goes who knows where. I really can’t think of one other Beatle song where Paul puts so much emotion into the “Golden Slumbers” refrain. It makes me want to weep. So beautiful! Thanks! I love this song.
When he chanced on ‘Golden Slumbers’ Paul was actually playing the family piano at the house he bought for his father in Heswall on the Wirral rather than in Liverpool itself, as Jim McCartney had moved from Forthlin Road and remarried in November 1964.
You’re right – thanks for that! I’ve updated the article.
Await, not awake? From 1904 book Teachers Edition for Elementary Grades, Ginn and Co.: Golden slumbers kiss your eyes / smiles await you when you rise / sleep pretty loved one, do not cry, and I will sing your lullaby. / ‘neath the drowsy drooping lid / dreams from fairy land are hid / sleep pretty loved one…. etc.
… I’ve always thought that, and it makes so much more sense. Logically, you arise AFTER waking up, so that’s when the smiles AWAIT you.
The instrument listing has George as the bassist. That may be problematic. Why? If you watch the Beatles Anthology, you can see Harrison, McCartney and producer George Martin listening to the original tapes on the mixing board. And Harrison assumed that Paul had played bass, whereupon Martin corrects him and says, “No, this was recorded live. Paul is on piano”. So if Harrison didn’t remember playing bass on it, it greatly implies John played it. (I’ve always been impressed by the bass playing on that track, too. It was so subtle and restrained. A delicate performance, sustaining the piano.)
John wasn’t there – he was recovering from his auto accident. As for George H.- hell, he couldn’t even remember what album this was on!
Found this in “The English Ditties: Selected From W. Chappell’s ‘Popular Music of the Olden Time'” edited by J. Oxenford. Published by Chappell & Co., no date listed but from the 1880s
https://imgur.com/a/z1KOd
I’ll start by stating the obvious that the only person who really knows what the song means is Paul and I doubt he will ever say. The song is widely loved and allows each person to interpret it how best they see fit. This is just my two cents. I agree most closely with charlie. I think Golden Slumbers was a metaphor about Paul’s sadness that the Beatles were coming to an end, harkening back to when the band was fun and uncomplicated and pulling together rather than coming apart. Even though Paul technically broke up the group with the release of his solo LP, McCartney, he was the group member that most wanted the Beatles to go on. By the summer of 1969, when Abbey Road was being recorded, I think he had resigned himself to the reality that John was not going to let that happen. It’s interesting that the song is a lullaby, and a lullaby is a song to sooth or comfort a young child. But it seems like it’s McCartney really looking to be soothed or comforted. So it’s like he assumes both roles in singing the song going back and forth between comforter and the person needing comforting. In the first four lines he’s singing in a style of a lullaby as comforter, though the words reflect sadness. In the chorus he’s singing in pain, almost like his personal primal scream therapy (I know that wasn’t a thing until the next year when John used it before recording Plastic Ono Band). Then when Paul sings the repeat of the first four lines, it sounds like he is nearly in tears. I’ve always thought that Carry That Weight was directed by Paul toward John about breaking up the group, that the weight of the fan reaction would be John’s to bear. And though few knew it when the album came out, The End was intended as the swan song, beautifully done, and elegantly stated, as Ringo did his drum solo, and Paul, George, and John traded their guitar solos of two measures each in three rotations (impressively in one take). And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make. And the band walks off the stage as a unit forever…though not before Paul peeks his head back out and winks with Her Majesty. Those old enough to remember the night John Lennon was killed probably remember many details about what they did and how they felt. I instinctively wanted to hear this medley of three songs, reflecting sadness, rage, and eventually reluctant acceptance of the reality.
I like your take.
I also see the song as a reminder that, in the end, it is not what happens to you, but your inner response to it, that makes the next imaginable thing, the carrying on, possible.
Very lovely but it makes me cry everytime . . .
Beautiful Paul McCartney song. I can understand someone else saying that it always makes them cry. I fell in love with this song the very first time I heard the “Abbey Road” album.Wonderful vocals by McCartney.
Her majesty should’ve been placed on the A side of the album and let “the end” be just that. The entire medley stands alone and most likely will never ever be surpassed at least not in my lifetime. Golden slumbers, well, it’s one of many gems on this side; quite possibly the brightest.
my interpretation is that’s its a three part story of all of our lives. whilst Paul did not realise this himself at the time of writing it, the lyrics came to him from the otherside.
golden slumbers is about being born and at first we are able to travel back spiritually to our home ( heaven or where we came) but gradually this ability is lost and the crying of the baby signifies this with the parent not realising and comforting the child.
carry that weight is about as we grow up we have to carry a lot of baggage on our shoulders and this gets heavier or lighter with the deeds we do.
the End is about when we die the amount of baggage we have carried on our shoulders is through emotions such as guilt and regret its superficial because its only as we die we realise what life was all about, and that all that every really mattered was spreading love for our brothers and sisters. hence the more love we gave in life, the more likely we would have accepted and received it back from others. We then realise that this is what life was about and what bring true happiness, and not what we thought made us happy ie greed ignorance and possessions.
I love this song, it’s sounds sad but I like it, once there was a way, reminds me that my mother died and I couldn’t be there.
But I will see her again.
I just to sign to her lullaby s in Spanish. She was my old little girl.??
I didn’t read through all of the responses, so I don’t know if this view has been represented, but the song to me as a male, clearly means that during every man’s life, there is a point of transition from boy to man, where his childhood home or at least that homey feeling you get from visiting your mother or your parents if they are still together, no longer exists. The innocence of childhood, even of young adulthood, has passed, and your family’s home is no longer your home. The home remains, even the sense of belonging may linger, but you are no longer part of it. You feel almost as a foreigner in your own home and you will carry that lack of home until you create it anew with YOUR own family (i.e. Spouse and kids). Until then you will have to carry that weight of no longer belonging in your own childhood home.
LMW28IF – I love your take on this song. Beautifully thought out and perfectly illustrates the way McCartney would hide his true feelings inside his lyrics.
McCartney was the one most emotionally crushed by the breakup so it makes sense he would express this and point the finger at John in masked lyrics.
What a beautiful piece of writing and what wonderful moving comments… about a great musical composition, indeed.
My sense is the music itself is drawing out the very deep feelings we associate with the old poetry of the early 1600’s. It is more serious, violins, orchestration and such.
The Beatles, when they were serious, and not just pop entertainment, were utterly brilliant, and this composition really shines in that light. Sure, the McCartney “take” on the poem adds an element of psychology that the original couldn’t have had. This is a rhetorical and allegorical lullaby as I envision it, more directed at older adults. We think back to childhood, yes… and we may sing a lullaby to our children… but this is more self-directed. I see this as universal, as philosophical, and not so much as about the Beatles, but as about what all people feel when they confront themselves, as children they once were. In the light of such memories, and even as death, awaits… and mortality is revealed, there is contentment, even joy, in contemplation, and of reliving these childhood sensations.
So perhaps rather than sadness, one may feel joy, indeed, happiness, in this composition.
I suggest that listening to the composition, detached from the original album, may also provide great joy.
Thanks to all who wrote about this deeply philosophical composition…
Cheers!
It also has a production quality about it that is ahead of its time; more like mid 70’s FM quality. I think the song is purely about once you become famous, home is never in one place; in Macca’s case Liverpool.
He can’t get back home, because fame won’t allow him to go back there as Joe Public and he misses that. A homesick lament, wanting to go back but it’s all changed.
Search Ytube for a video of Paul in a pub back in Merseyside.
People say that Hollywood stars sell their souls to the devil for their fame and fortune. I interpret this song as meaning once there was a way back home, meaning back to heaven, to God. But since they’ve sold their souls and since realized the error of their way, they know that they can no longer enter heaven for what they have done. I’m sure that most likely the song was not purposely written to reflect that, but every single time I hear this song it’s like my soul recognizes what the song means. It’s very sad, but also, a good warning to those who might make the same mistake. The rest of the song sounds like it’s about relaxing and enjoying what you can while you’re still on this earth. Close your eyes makes me thing of forgetting/ignoring your troubles since there is no way back anyway.
I think the beautiful thing with this song is it conveys so many emotive feelings for so many of us as we travel through our lives, its timeless and it can help us to cherish our relationships with each other and try and see the hood in each other.
I sent this to my daughter in-law … it just fits our beautiful 2 year old grand daughter. “Sleep pretty baby do not cry.” Makes me tear up. Bless Paul et al for their genius.
Golden slumbers kiss your eyes,
Smiles awake you when you rise;
Sleep, pretty wantons, do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby,
Rock them, rock them, lullaby.
Care is heavy, therefore sleep you,
You are care, and care must keep you;
Sleep, pretty wantons, do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby,
Rock them, rock them, lullaby.
Wonton?
I’m confused. I saw that word used in the article, then in your comment. I thought it was darling.
I think one of the things that sets The Beatles apart from other groups is how their songs can mean very different things to different people, as seen in this comments section. This is true for other groups as well, but not to the same extent as for The Beatles. All of the explanations in the comments make sense, but the person I agree with most has to be Nate.
For me this song is about the transition from childhood to adulthood, leaving the family home and the added responsibility that this brings. The fact that you no longer have a well-defined ‘home’ can create a sense of longing for a past to which you cannot return. As well as an actual physical home, this could also mean a metaphorical ‘home’, i.e. a situation in which everything is comfortable and you have no worries.
“Carry that Weight” is then about the burden of the mistakes you make and the wrong decisions you take in life, and the consequences they have. Another big difference between childhood and adulthood is that you have more responsibility for your actions, and their consequences can stay with you for much longer.
“The End” then completely defies the tone of the last two songs by saying that, “in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make”. This is reminding you that, although you may long for the past or regret the mistakes you made, in the end the thing that matters most is your approach to life and the effect you have on other people. There are two ways of interpreting that last line: the first is that, in order to have a fulfilling life, you have to focus on loving other people and making their lives better (i.e. the more love you make, the more love you take); the other interpretation is that, in order to spread love to other people, you first have to see the beauty and love in your own life (i.e. the more love you take, the more love you make). To me, both interpretations are equally correct, and the balanced way in which the line is written allows people to interpret it whichever way they wish.
Does anyone know what bass is used in this song? I know part of it is probably the way it is mixed, but i love the warmth/roundness of the low end and the clicking high end of the bass whenever it starts playing.
I just get tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat every time I hear it. Paul’s voice is so raw and filled with emotion (pain? sadness? loss? all of that and more?) and I just can’t get enough of it. I can’t list how many times I have listened to it but it never, ever gets old. I’m a die-hard Elton fan, but this is definitely in my top five.
My Dad, Richard Nairn was one of the three session Trumpet players on ‘Golden Slumbers’. I’m not sure who the other two were, but think, like my dad that they were musicians who worked on the shows in The West End theatres. I was eight years old at the time and remember years later him telling my brother and I that the recording sessions at Abbey Road ran later than expected. He had to ask George Martin how much longer it was going to take as they had to get to the theatre to do their shows. It was a bit of a rush, but they made it.
I had the privilege of spending the day at Abbey Road a few years ago when my nephew Richard Van Nairn and his friend Ryan Maher were recording an album there for their band, ‘Mary-X’. I told one of the staff at the studio about my dad and he let us all visit the studio where ‘Golden Slumbers’ was recorded. A very special experience for our family, and a very special song for us as my dad died in 1985 at the age of 54.