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The
Inner Light
(George Harrison)
George
Harrison: Vocals
John Lennon: Vocals
Paul McCartney: Vocals
Sharad Gosh or Hanuman Jadev: Shenai
Hariprasad Chaurasia or S.R. Kenkare: Flute
Ashish Khan: Sarod
Mehapurush Misra: Tabla, pakavaj
Rij Ram Desad: Harmonium
Recorded
January 12 and Feburary 6, 8 1968.
Available on:
Past Masters Volume Two
George
Harrison's The Inner Light was chosen to shine on the B-side
of the Lady
Madonna single, simply because the others liked it so
much. It was the first Harrison-composition to appear on
a Beatles single in the UK.
In 1967,
Harrison was asked to compose the soundtrack for a movie
called Wonderwall, starring Jane Birkin and Jack MacGowran.
During the 3 months it took to Harrison record the soundtrack,
he flew to EMI's recording studio in Bombay where he taped
a number of instrumentals using local musicians (nobody
knows the precise line up of the musicians he hired.) One
of the tracks recorded in Bombay was an instrumental version
of The Inner Light.
The song's
lyrics were based on verse 40 of the holy book Tao Te Ching,
which had been recommended to Harrison by Juan Mascaro,
a Sankrit teacher at Cambridge University in England. Harrison
only made slight alterations to the original text. He first
refused to sing the song himself, becasue he though the
key was too high and that the song was too demanding for
him to sing. Fortunately, Lennon and McCartney managed to
change his mind. The Inner Light turned out to be one of
the best vocal performances Harrison ever did on a Beatles
record.
Some have
speculated if The Inner Light was inspired by Pink Floyd's
Chapter 24 from their 1967 album Piper At The Gates Of Dawn,
which also is based on the Chinese I Ching or Book Of Changes.
The Inner Light
(George Harrison)
Without
going out of my door
I can know all things of earth
Without looking out of my window
I could know the ways of heaven
The farther
one travels
The less one knows
The less one really knows
Without
going out of my door
You can know all things of earth
With out looking out of my window
You could know the ways of heaven
The farther
one travels
The less one knows
The less one really knows
Arrive
without travelling
See all without looking
Do all without doing
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