There has always been a debate about who pulled the strings in the songwriting partnership between John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Although both songwriters had been known for making letter-perfect rock and roll throughout their time with The Beatles, they started to develop their unique styles when working outside of their usual mop-top configuration. While McCartney delivered one of the band’s most enduring ballads with ‘Yesterday’, Lennon put together one of his most nostalgic melodies with the tune to ‘In My Life’.
But it begs the question, who was behind most of the song’s writing? While the band members were usually known to take the lead vocal on their songs, there has always been some question about who wrote what in the song, as both men took partial ownership of the lyrics and melody over the years.
When talking about the creation of the song, Lennon said that it began life as a nostalgic ode to the days that he experienced back in Liverpool, saying, “I had a complete set of lyrics after struggling with a journalistic vision of a trip from home to downtown on a bus naming every sight. It became ‘In My Life’, which is a remembrance of friends and lovers of the past. Paul helped with the middle eight musically. But all lyrics written, signed, sealed, and delivered”.
However, McCartney claims that most of the song’s music was written by him, stating, “I recall writing the whole melody. And it actually does sound very like me, if you analyse it. I was obviously working to lyrics. The melody’s structure is very me. So my recollection is saying to John, ‘Just go and have a cup of tea or something. Let me be with this for ten minutes on my own and I’ll do it’”.
When looking at the way both writers constructed melodies, though, the mathematical dissection of the tune constructed by NPR insists that Lennon had written the lion’s share of the music to the tune. Despite McCartney’s recollection, most of the chords for the song are more in line with what Lennon had been doing for most of his ballads, first turning up with this style of chord progression when working on tracks like ‘If I Fell’ from A Hard Day’s Night.
Lennon would use the chord progression again when sculpting ‘Woman’ for his solo album Double Fantasy. Despite the song being credited to Lennon and McCartney, though, some of the instrumental flourishes that the song became known for wouldn’t exist without the other Beatles.
Although the song works just as well with chords and a vocal melody, George Harrison’s gorgeous riff in between the verses is one of the main calling cards of the song. Their producer, George Martin, should also be commended for his piano arrangement, bringing a baroque flair into the song that went along with the wistful quality of the lyrics.
Even though Lennon and McCartney had strong disagreements about who could claim ownership of the song, ‘In My Life’ is a testament to both of them working at the peak of their powers. They may have separated themselves more often throughout the years, but it speaks to the quality of the song that both songwriters felt such a strong emotional attachment to the finalised version.
