From: dmac@julia.math.ucla.edu (saki)
Subject: Re: "Seventeen"
Organization: UCLA Mathematics Department
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 92 20:16:33 GMT

In article <6379@m1.cs.man.ac.uk> ross-c@scs.leeds.ac.uk (R Clement) writes:
>The version on the Hamburg tapes sounds fairly near it's final form. 
>I re-assert
>my original thesis. (Serious - I think it's a great song).

Your original thesis was that "Seventeen", a.k.a. "I Saw Her Standing 
There", was available for play by the Boys on 6 June 1962, the day
of the EMI audition? I'm still not convinced. I just don't think it
existed that early.

The Hamburg tapes (I assume Star-Club recordings are what you mean) are
from 31 December 1962. The song was near its final form then because
presumably the kinks had been worked out. And the Beatles were set to
record the song just a little over a month later. This was more than
six months after the EMI audition.

There's an earlier tape, of lesser fidelity, commonly known as the
"Cavern Sessions", where "Seventeen" is being played at a slower
tempo and is accompanied by a rather torturous harmonica. Have you
heard this one? The players are still clearly working out the 
song's structure and arrangement. It's hard to tell whether this
version was really recorded at the Cavern Club or comes from some
portable tape recorder used during an EMI run-through session, or
whether it was recorded in another practice venue. The session is
not, of course, dated. But circumstantial evidence indicates 
several hypotheses:

a) The song bears the indelible influence of John's admiration for
Delbert McClinton's harmonica, which derives (as Steve Carter and
Mark Lewisohn, no less, have told us) from the Bruce Channel release
"Hey Baby". This was released in May 1962 in England, and while the
single may have initially influenced John, it's more likely that John's
experience actually meeting McClinton on 21 June 1962 (when sources
indicate that McClinton gave John tips on harp playing) was the
prime mover. A string of Beatles songs, from "Love Me Do" to "Thank 
You, Girl", all bear the stamp of John's localized mania for the
instrument. The appearance of the harmonica on an early working version
of "Seventeen" and its disappearance from the version played at year's
end pinpoint the song to the latter half of 1962. I'll suggest that
"Seventeen"s genesis just missed the date of the EMI audition.

b) There's a photo, taken by Paul's brother Mike (and not dated, by
the way), of John and Paul practicing the song on acoustic guitars
in Paul's living room at his house on Forthlin Road. In hairstyle,
dress, and manner, they look like they do in similar photos from the
latter half of 1962. Because of the sweaters they wear, I'd even 
suggest the weather had turned nippy, maybe autumnal...though I know
Liddypool's weather can be fickle.

c) A careful listen to the mysterious "Cavern" tape, with the slow
"Seventeen", reveals a slightly more complex percussion element than
Pete Best was capable of producing. It may be a judgement call, but
I'd swear on The Book and The Chron both that this is Ringo playing
drums on the work-through version...and Ringo didn't join the group
till August 1962.

d) And although this evidence is less compelling, "Seventeen" does
not show up in any available playlists, or in any radio performances
from which we have airchecks, from the first half of 1962. It's
especially worth noting that, among all the covers the Boys performed
for their Decca audition, they relied on standards of their compositional
repertoire like "Hello Little Girl" and "Love of the Loved" and "Like
Dreamers Do". It's logical, in an audition, to attempt to impress. If
these were the best L&M could come up with at the time, I'd suggest
further that "Seventeen" didn't exist in January 1962. And its absence
from radio performance through all of 1962 indicates to me that
it simply wasn't ready for public play until the end of the year.

I think it's a great song, too. But I think if it had been written,
worked through, and polished by 6 June 1962, it would have been a
part of the EMI audition, without question. And there's no indication
that this was the case.

--
"The Lana Sisters, clad in pink, added a welcome feminine flavour.
'Much better than those Beatles' I heard one gentleman remark."
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saki (dmac@math.ucla.edu)
Newsgroups: rec.music.beatles