Forum

I’ve been listening to the Beatles for more than 45 years and have been trying to play some of their songs for about 40. You know the occasional attempt at “Blackbird”, “Michelle”, “And I Love Her”, “Something”, and “If I Fell”. Ballads.

But never, ever, have I attempted something like ”I Wanna Hold Your Hand”. It always seemed impossible (to me) to do justice to a fast Beatle ‘rocker’. So I never tried. But then I stumbled upon Natalie Hawkins’ version on YouTube. I thought it was great and decided to give it a try. Though her version is definitely not a “rocker”, I must say it was a blast to learn. What interesting chords. Who would have thought to play a B7 in the key of G? Bminor sure - but a B7?

Anyway, here’s Natalie’s original video (she’s playing capo’d on the 4th fret):




I downloaded her video and slowed it down to drop her voice a half step (giving her a slightly huskier/fuller voice), and then added compression, equalization, and a slight stereo effect, and then I tried to play along with her:

Hey Daryl that was excellent! Really enjoyed your performance. Sounds like a bit of work went into getting the lead singer part to work for you. Thanks for sharing your vid.

Good on ya mate that was really enjoyable.

Your technology know-how is something to behold, and your guitar playing is great as well. I wish I could say that I've been playing for forty years.

Really nice collaboration Daryl. It feels nice as a ballad too.

Very nice Daryl, I really like how smooth you play. Your playing really add to the good singing instead of just accompanying it.

Marc

Daryl,

Another great job. You've become quite the expert in putting these together. I really enjoyed this one. Thanks.



MarkM

Hi Daryl,
Really enjoyed that,i wouldnt know where to start to do something like that on a laptop,you must be up on youre technology allright,
Tommy

Great job Daryl! Thats about 5 down and ...er couple of hundred to go? Natalie is lovely and your playing smooth as ever. I suspect the inspiration came from the film Across the Universe:

Jim: Thanks for watching. I changed Natalie's voice just for the fun of it. It seems that YouTube munges the audio when a video gets uploaded. But I also thought her voice in her original video got too loud in a couple of places and got distorted. I just tried to clean it up a little.

Chas: Thanks for watching. I have another (non-Beatle) video in the works.

Jay: Thanks for the compliments. Your tech know-how ain't too shabby either! And your guitar playing is great now. I can't imagine how good it will be with 40 years under your belt!

Michele: Thanks. I really like Natalie's version. I'm always on the lookout for new interpretations of my favorite songs.

Marc. Thank you sir. I tried just strumming along with Natalie but I couldn't keep in time with her (without seeing her hands), and with the emotion she sang with she ever so subtly changed her timing and I just couldn't keep up. So, I decided to play a bit sporadically. Even then my timing got off in places. I guess it's easier to collaborate in real-time.

Mark: Thank you. I wish more people would post more collaborations. I really enjoy seeing them. And I'd be more than happy to help anyone with technical questions.

Tommy: Thank you. Doing a YouTube collaboration really isn't very hard. I use only free software to do mine (laptop built-in video cam and mike, Windows Movie Maker, Audacity, and the free version of AVS Video Editor).

Chris: Thank you. My next video will probably be a non-Beatle song! Gotta keep ya guessin' I think you're right about the inspiration for Natalie's version.