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George Martin
Photo: Adamsharp, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons17

George Martin

English record producer (1926–2016)

Sir George Henry Martin (3 January 1926 – 8 March 2016) was an English record producer, arranger, composer, conductor, and musician. He was commonly referred to as the "fifth Beatle" due to his extensive involvement in each of the Beatles' original albums.2

From Wikipedia’s article on George Martin (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Born Jan 3, 1926, died Mar 8, 2016.1

About

Martin's formal musical expertise and interest in novel recording practices facilitated the group's rudimentary musical education and desire for new musical sounds to record. Most of their orchestral and string arrangements were written by Martin, and he played the piano or keyboards on a number of their records. Their collaborations resulted in popular, highly acclaimed records with innovative sounds, such as the 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Martin's career spanned more than sixty years in music, film, television and live performance. Before working with the Beatles and other pop musicians, he produced comedy and novelty records in the 1950s and early 1960s as the head of EMI's Parlophone label, working with Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan and Bernard Cribbins, among others. In 1965, he left EMI and formed his own production company, Associated Independent Recording.

AllMusic has described Martin as the "world's most famous record producer". In his career, Martin produced 30 number-one hit singles in the United Kingdom and 23 number-one hits in the United States, winning six Grammy Awards. In recognition of his services to the music industry and popular culture, he was made a Knight Bachelor in 1996.

From Wikipedia’s article on George Martin, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.2

Companies

Early life and education

  • Date not recordedGuildhall School of Music and Drama3

Martin was born on 3 January 1926 in North London to Henry ("Harry") and Bertha Beatrice (née Simpson) Martin. He had an older sister, Irene. In Martin's early years, the family lived modestly, first in Highbury and then Drayton Park. Harry worked as a craftsman carpenter in a small attic workshop, while Bertha cooked meals at a communal stove in their apartment building. In 1931, the family moved to Aubert Park in Highbury, where they lived with electricity for the first time.

When he was six, Martin's family acquired a piano that sparked his interest in music. At eight years of age, he convinced his parents that he should take piano lessons, but those ended after only six sessions because of a disagreement between his mother and the teacher. Martin created his first piano composition, "The Spider's Dance", at age eight. Martin continued to learn piano on his own through his youth, building a working knowledge of music theory through his natural perfect pitch.

As a child, he attended several Roman Catholic schools, including Our Lady of Sion (Holloway), St Joseph's School (Highgate), and at St Ignatius' College (Stamford Hill), where he won a scholarship. When World War II broke out, Martin's family left London and he was enrolled at Bromley Grammar School. At Bromley, Martin led and played piano in a locally popular dance band, the Four Tune Tellers. The pianists George Shearing and Meade Lux Lewis influenced his style. He also took up acting in a troupe called the Quavers, and, with money earned from playing dances, he resumed formal piano lessons and learned musical notation.

Despite Martin's continued interest in music and "fantasies about being the next Rachmaninoff", he did not initially choose music as a career. Aged 17, in 1943, Martin volunteered for the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy, having been spurred on by their exploits in the Battle of Taranto. He trained at HMS St Vincent in Gosport. The war ended before Martin was involved in any combat, and he left the service in January 1947. On 26 July 1945, Martin appeared on BBC Radio for the first time during a Royal Navy variety show; he played a self-composed piano piece. As he climbed rank in the Navy, Martin consciously adopted the upper-class accent and gentlemanly social demeanour common for officers.

Encouraged by the pianist and teacher Sidney Harrison, Martin used his veteran's grant to attend the Guildhall School of Music and Drama from 1947 to 1950. He studied piano as his main instrument and oboe as his secondary, being interested in the music of Sergei Rachmaninoff, Maurice Ravel, and Cole Porter. Martin also took courses at Guildhall in music composition and orchestration. After graduating, he worked for the BBC's classical music department, also earning money as an oboe player in local bands.

From Wikipedia’s article on George Martin (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Career

Occupation: bandleader, record producer, audio engineer, musician, composer, music arranger, conductor.5

EMI and Parlophone

Martin joined EMI in November 1950 as an assistant to Oscar Preuss, the head of EMI's Parlophone label. Although having been regarded by EMI as a vital German imprint in the past, it was then not taken seriously and used only for EMI's insignificant acts. Among Martin's early duties was managing Parlophone's classical records catalogue, including Baroque ensemble sessions with Karl Haas; Martin, Haas, and Peter Ustinov soon founded the London Baroque Society together. He also developed a friendship and working relationship with composer Sidney Torch and signed Ron Goodwin to a recording contract. In 1953, Martin produced Goodwin's first record, an instrumental rendition of Charlie Chaplin's theme from Limelight, which made it to no. 3 on the British charts. Despite these early breakthroughs, Martin resented EMI's preference in the early 1950s for short-playing 78 rpm records instead of the new longer-playing 33+1⁄3 and 45 rpm formats coming into fashion on other labels. He also proved uncomfortable as a song plugger when occasionally assigned the task by Preuss, comparing himself to a "sheep among wolves".Preuss retired as head of Parlophone in April 1955, leaving the 29-year-old Martin to take over the label. Martin's first hit production came in 1956 in the Johnny Dankworth Band's jazz parody "The Three Blind Mice". However, he had to fight to retain the label, as by late 1956 EMI managers considered moving Parlophone's successful artists to Columbia Records or His Master's Voice, with Martin possibly to take a junior A&R role at the His Master's Voice under Wally Ridley. Martin staved off corporate pressure with successes in comedy records, such as a 1957 recording of the two-man show featuring Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, At the Drop of a Hat. His work boosted the profile of Parlophone from a "sad little company" to a highly profitable business over time. As head of Parlophone, Martin recorded classical and Baroque music, original cast recordings, jazz, and regional music from around Britain and Ireland. He became the first British A&R man to capitalize on the 1956 skiffle boom when he signed the Vipers Skiffle Group after seeing them in London's 2i's Coffee Bar.

Martin produced numerous comedy and novelty records. His first success in the genre was the "Mock Mozart" single, performed by Peter Ustinov with Antony Hopkins. In 1953, Martin produced Peter Sellers' debut in music, the failed single "Jakka and the Flying Saucers". Two years later, Martin worked with BBC radio comedy stars the Goons on a parody version of "Unchained Melody", but the song's publishers blocked it from release. The Goons subsequently left Parlophone for Decca, but Sellers, a member of the group, achieved minor success with Martin in 1957 with "Boiled Bananas and Carrots"/"Any Old Iron". Recognising that Sellers was capable of "a daydreaming form of humour which could be amusing and seductive without requiring the trigger of a live audience", Martin pitched a full album to EMI. The result, The Best of Sellers (1958), has been cited by the music historian Mark Lewisohn as the first British comedy LP created in a recording studio. Martin scored a major success in 1961 with the Beyond the Fringe show cast album, starring, among others, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore; the show catalysed Britain's satire boom in the early 1960s.Martin courted controversy in summer 1960, when he produced a cover of the teen novelty song "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini" and released it mere days after the release of the record in the UK, opening him to public accusations of piracy. Nonetheless, his first British number-one came a year later, in May 1961, with the Temperance Seven song "You're Driving Me Crazy". He then earned praise from EMI chairman Sir Joseph Lockwood for his top-ten 1962 hit with Bernard Cribbins, "The Hole in the Ground". Though Martin wanted to add rock and roll to Parlophone's repertoire, he struggled to find a "fireproof" hit-making pop artist or group.

Martin cultivated a working relationship with Brian Epstein. They discussed the Beatles on 13 February 1962. As a result Martin auditioned them on 6 June 1962. He gave them a record contract backdated to include the music recorded in the audition. Love Me Do was later re-recorded and became the group's first hit in October 1962. In December 1962 in Liverpool Epstein showed Martin other successful local acts like Gerry and the Pacemakers and the Fourmost. Martin urged Epstein also to audition them for EMI. Gerry and the Pacemakers scored their first no. 1 with their version of "How Do You Do It?", which Martin produced, in April 1963. Martin also produced the Epstein-managed Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, the Fourmost, and Cilla Black. Between the Beatles, Gerry and the Pacemakers, and Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas, Martin-produced and Epstein-managed acts were responsible for 37 weeks of no. 1 singles in 1963, transforming Parlophone into the leading EMI label. His work with such Liverpudlian artists contributed to the development of beat music.

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Rivalries and tensions at EMI

By the time he signed a three-year contract renewal in 1959, Martin sought, but failed, to obtain a royalty on Parlophone's record sales, a practice becoming common in the US: "I reckoned that if I was going to devote my life to building up something which wasn't mine, I deserved some form of commission", he reflected. The issue continued to linger in his mind, and Martin said he "nearly didn't sign" his spring 1962 contract renewal over this matter—even threatening EMI managing director L. G. ("Len") Wood that he would walk away from his job. With their relationship strained, Wood exacted a measure of revenge by having Martin sign the Beatles to a record contract to appease interest from EMI's publishing arm, Ardmore & Beechwood.Martin also advocated that the Beatles' penny-per-record royalty rate be doubled; Wood agreed to this, but only if the Beatles signed a five-year contract renewal in exchange. When Martin countered that EMI should raise the royalty without conditions, Wood grudgingly acquiesced, but Martin believed that, "from that moment on, I was considered a traitor within EMI". In 1955, EMI purchased American recording company Capitol Records. Thereafter, Capitol's head of international A&R, Dave Dexter Jr., chose to issue very few British records in the US, to Martin and his EMI A&R colleagues' dismay. Dexter passed on issuing the Beatles' first four singles in the US, driving Martin out of desperation to issue "She Loves You" on the small, independent Swan Records. Martin and the Beatles also resented Capitol's practice of issuing records often highly divergent from British record releases, sometimes affecting album titles, cover art, songs included, and even Martin's production. This treatment did not cease until the band signed a new contract with EMI in January 1967.

Separation from EMI and start of Associated Independent Recording

After his repeated clashes over salary terms with EMI management, Martin informed them in June 1964 that he would not renew his contract in 1965. Though EMI managing director Len Wood attempted to persuade Martin to stay with the company, Martin continued to insist that he would not work for EMI without receiving a commission on record sales. Wood offered him a 3% commission minus "overhead costs", which would have translated to an £11,000 bonus for 1964, though, in doing so, Wood revealed to Martin that EMI had made £2.2 million in net profit from Martin's records that year. "With that simple sentence, he cut straight through whatever vestige of an umbilical cord still bound me to EMI. … I was flabbergasted", Martin observed. As Martin exited the company in August 1965, he recruited a number of other EMI staffers, including Norman Newell, Ron Richards, John Burgess, his wife, Judy, and Decca's Peter Sullivan. Artists associated with Martin's new production team included Adam Faith, Manfred Mann, Peter and Gordon, the Hollies, Tom Jones, and Engelbert Humperdinck.

Martin conceived of his new company as being modelled on the Associated London Scripts cooperative of comedy writers in the 1950s and 1960s, offering equal shares in the company to his A&R colleagues and expecting them to pay studio costs proportionate to their earnings. He named it Associated Independent Recording (AIR). Short of funds and with many of AIR's associated acts still under contract to EMI, Martin negotiated a business arrangement with EMI that would give EMI the right of first refusal on any AIR production. In exchange, EMI would pay a producer's royalty on all AIR records. Martin's departure from EMI and foundation of an independent production company was major news in the music press. Wood attempted to lure Martin back to EMI in 1969 with an offered salary of £25,000, but Martin rejected it.

The Beatles

Epstein approaches EMI

In November 1961, the Beatles manager Brian Epstein travelled to London to meet with record executives from EMI and Decca Records in the interest of obtaining a recording contract for his band. Epstein met with EMI's general marketing director Ron White, with whom he had a longstanding business relationship, and left a copy of the Beatles' single with Tony Sheridan, "My Bonnie". White said he would play it for EMI's four A&R directors, including George Martin (though it later emerged that he neglected to do so, playing it only for two of them). In mid-December, White replied that EMI was not interested in signing the Beatles.

Martin claimed that he was contacted by Sid Colman of EMI music publisher Ardmore & Beechwood at the request of Epstein, though Colman's colleague Kim Bennett later disputed this. In any event, Martin arranged a meeting on 13 February 1962 with Epstein, who played for Martin the recording of the Beatles' failed January audition for Decca Records. Epstein recalled that Martin liked George Harrison's guitar playing and preferred Paul McCartney's singing voice to John Lennon's, though Martin himself recalled that he "wasn't knocked out at all" by the "lousy tape". With Martin apparently uninterested, Ardmore & Beechwood's Colman and Bennett pressured EMI management to sign the Beatles in hopes of gaining the rights to Lennon–McCartney song publishing on Beatle records; Colman and Bennett even offered to pay for the expense of the Beatles' first EMI recordings. EMI managing director Len Wood rejected this proposal. Nonetheless, to appease Colman's interest in the Beatles, Wood directed Martin to sign the group.

Martin met with Epstein again on 9 May at EMI Studios in London, and informed him he would give the Beatles a standard recording contract with Parlophone, to record a minimum of six tracks in the first year. The royalty rate was to be one penny for each record sold on 85% of records, which was to be split among the four members and Epstein. They agreed to hold the Beatles' first recording on 6 June 1962.

Early Beatles sessions (1962)

Though Martin later called the 6 June 1962 session at EMI's studio two an "audition", as he had never seen the band play before, the session was actually intended to record material for the first Beatles single. Ron Richards and his engineer Norman Smith recorded four songs: "Besame Mucho", "Love Me Do", "Ask Me Why", and "P.S. I Love You". Martin arrived during the recording of "Love Me Do"; between takes, he introduced himself to the Beatles and subtly changed the arrangement. The verdict was not promising, however, as Richards and Martin complained about Pete Best's drumming, and Martin thought their original songs were simply not good enough. In the control room, Martin asked the individual Beatles if there was anything they personally did not like, to which Harrison replied, "I don't like your tie." That was the turning point, according to Smith, as Lennon and McCartney joined in with jokes and comic wordplay, that made Martin think that he should sign them to a contract for their wit alone. After deliberating for a time whether to make Lennon or McCartney the lead vocalist of the group, Martin decided he would let them retain their shared lead role: "Suddenly it hit me that I had to take them as they were, which was a new thing. I was being too conventional."Though charmed by the Beatles' personalities, Martin was unimpressed with the musical repertoire from their first session. "I didn't think the Beatles had any song of any worth—they gave me no evidence whatsoever that they could write hit material", he said later. He arranged for the Beatles to record Mitch Murray's "How Do You Do It" at a September session, with the Beatles now featuring Ringo Starr on drums. The Beatles also re-recorded "Love Me Do" and played an early version of "Please Please Me", which Martin thought was "dreary" and needed to be sped up. While Martin pushed for "How Do You Do It" to be released, the band and Murray protested, so he decided to have "Love Me Do" issued as the A-side of the Beatles' first single and save "How Do You Do It" for another occasion.

Despite Martin's doubts about the song, "Love Me Do" steadily climbed in the British charts, peaking at number 17 in December 1962. With his doubts about the Beatles' songwriting abilities now quashed, Martin told the band they should re-record "Please Please Me" and make it their second single. He also suggested the Beatles record a full album, a suggestion Mark Lewisohn later deemed "genuinely mind-boggling", given how little exposure the Beatles had achieved so far. On 26 November, the Beatles attempted "Please Please Me" a third time. After the recording, Martin looked over the mixing desk and said, "Gentlemen, you have just made your first number one record".

Commercial breakout (1963–1964)

As Martin had predicted, "Please Please Me" reached no. 1 on most of the British singles charts upon its release in January 1963. "From that moment, we simply never stood still", he reflected. For the Beatles' first LP, Martin had the group record 10 new tracks to include with the four tracks already released. They accomplished this in one marathon recording session, on 11 February 1963, with the Beatles recording a mix of Lennon–McCartney originals and covers from their stage act. Nine days later, Martin overdubbed a piano part to the song "Misery" and a celesta on "Baby It's You". The resulting album, Please Please Me, became a huge success in the UK, spending 30 consecutive weeks at top of the charts, a feat no album bar one had accomplished by then.

At this early stage of their working relationship, Martin played a major role in refining and arranging the Beatles' self-written songs to make them commercially appealing: "I taught them the importance of the hook. You had to get people's attention in the first ten seconds, and so I would generally get hold of their song and 'top and tail' it—make a beginning and end. And also make sure it ran for about two-and-a-half minutes so that it would fit DJs' programmes". He added that, at the beginning of his recording career with the band, his aim was to "[get] a really loud rhythm sound", manifested in "She Loves You". The Beatles' frenetic recording schedule continued in March 1963, as they recorded "From Me to You", "Thank You Girl", and an early version of "One After 909". Martin altered the arrangement of "From Me to You", substituting the Beatles' idea for a guitar intro with a vocalized "da-da-da-da-da-dum-dum-da", backed by overdubbed harmonica.

The Beatles returned to EMI Studios on 1 July to record a new single, "She Loves You". Martin liked the song but was sceptical of its closing chord, which he found clichéd. The Beatles, now increasingly confident in their songwriting, pushed back. Martin and the recording engineer Norman Smith changed the studio microphone arrangement for the song, giving the bass and drums a more prominent sound on the record. "She Loves You" was released in August and it would become the best-selling UK single by any artist in the 1960s. Around this time, the foundations for Beatlemania had been laid. Sometime in 1963, Martin and Brian Epstein arranged a loose formula to record two Beatles albums and four singles per year. The Beatles began work on their second LP on 18 July. Like their debut album, this record reflected the repertoire of the Beatles' contemporary stage act. Martin played piano on several of the tracks, including "Money (That's What I Want)" and "Not a Second Time", and also played Hammond organ on "I Wanna Be Your Man". With the Beatles came out in November 1963 and remained at no. 1 on the album charts for five months.

Martin and the Beatles recorded their next single, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" on 17 October—their first recording session with four-track recording. Impressed with the song, Martin merely suggested adding handclaps and adding compression to Lennon's rhythm guitar sound to imitate the sound of an organ. "I Want to Hold Your Hand" extended the Beatles' success to the US. Shortly after, he had the band record German-language versions of "She Loves You" and "I Want to Hold Your Hand" for the West German market. Martin travelled to New York with the Beatles on 7 February, as the band embarked on their first visit to America—including landmark performances on The Ed Sullivan Show.In late February, the band re-entered the studio and began recording the soundtrack album to the Beatles' upcoming untitled feature film. The film, album, and lead single were all titled A Hard Day's Night. In addition to producing the Beatles' songs for the album—their first not to feature any cover songs—Martin orchestrated several instrumental numbers for the film. The film was a success, and the album and single both reached no. 1 in the UK and US in July. Martin joined them for part of their August/September North American tour, recording their performance at the Hollywood Bowl. The Beatles began recording their next studio album, Beatles for Sale in August, though the sessions continued intermittently through late October and the record was released in December. Martin observed that the Beatles were "war weary" during many of these sessions, and the album included six covers because Lennon and McCartney had not written enough songs to fill out the record. Beatles for Sale also featured new percussion sounds on several tracks, such as timpani and chocalho. The album reached no. 1 in the UK but was not released in the US.

Shift to studio experimenting (1965–1966)

In mid-February 1965, Martin and the Beatles began five months of sessions to record the music for their second film, Help!. The Beatles adopted new studio techniques for these sessions, typically overdubbing vocals and other sounds onto a carefully laid rhythm track. The group by now had grown confident in the studio, and Martin encouraged them to explore new ideas for songs, such as an outro to "Ticket to Ride" that was at a faster tempo than the rest of song. They continued to experiment with unusual instruments, such as an alto flute solo for "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away" scored by Martin. It was Martin's idea to score a string quartet accompaniment for "Yesterday" against McCartney's initial reluctance. Martin played the song in the style of Bach to show McCartney the voicings that were available. Help!, again, peaked at no. 1 in the UK and the US.

Sgt. Pepper (1966–1967)

By the time the Beatles resumed recording on 24 November 1966, they had decided to discontinue touring and focus their creative energies on the recording studio. Martin reflected, "the time had come for experiment. The Beatles knew it, and I knew it." Their late 1966 sessions stretched into April 1967, forming what became Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band—a record continuing the Beatles' and Martin's imaginative use of the studio to create new sounds on record. He was involved as an arranger throughout the album, except for "She's Leaving Home".

Magical Mystery Tour, "All You Need Is Love", and Yellow Submarine (1967–1968)

Before Sgt Pepper was even released, the Beatles held several sessions from April to June 1967 to record additional songs for a yet-to-be-determined purpose: "Magical Mystery Tour", and "Baby, You're a Rich Man", among others. Martin later described many

From Wikipedia’s article on George Martin (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Personal life

  • BornJan 3, 1926, Highbury6
  • DiedMar 8, 2016, Coleshill7 8
  • CitizenshipUnited Kingdom, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland9

In 1946, Martin met Jean ("Sheena") Chisholm, a fellow member of the Royal Navy's choir. They bonded over their mutual love of music. Martin's mother, Bertha, strongly disapproved of Chisholm as a partner for Martin, fuelling early strain in the relationship. Nevertheless, they were married at the University of Aberdeen on 3 January 1948. Bertha died three weeks later of a brain haemorrhage, and Martin felt responsible for his mother's death. Martin and Sheena had two children, Alexis (born 1953) and Gregory Paul (born 1957). Around 1955, the Martins moved from London and bought a home in the development town of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, some 20 miles north. By the early 1960s, Martin pleaded Chisholm for a divorce and moved out of their home, but she refused, citing her childcare needs. Their divorce was finalized in February 1965.

On his first day of work at EMI Studios in 1950, Martin met Judy Lockhart Smith, a secretary to Parlophone director Oscar Preuss. Martin chose to retain her as a secretary when he assumed the direction of Parlophone in 1955, and they commuted together from Hatfield each day. Martin and Lockhart Smith began a discreet affair in the late 1950s. They married on 24 June 1966 at the Marylebone Registry Office, and had two children, Lucie (born 1967) and Giles (born 1969).

Martin was firm friends with Spike Milligan, and was best man at Milligan's second wedding: "I loved The Goon Show, and issued an album of it on my label Parlophone, which is how I got to know Spike." The album was Bridge on the River Wye, a spoof of the film The Bridge on the River Kwai, being based on the 1957 Goon Show episode "An African Incident".

In the mid-1970s, Martin's hearing started to decline; in an interview with the Institute of Professional Sound, he stated that he first noticed it when realizing that he couldn't detect high frequencies that an engineer was using to evaluate tonality. Giles consequently served as an impromptu assistant and helped George hide the condition as it worsened over the next two decades. Martin attributed his hearing loss to his constant production work, stating that "I was in the studio for 14 hours at a stretch, and never let my ears repair. There's no question that listening to loud music was a major contribution to my hearing loss." By 2014, he relied on a combination of hearing aids and lip-reading to communicate face to face.

Martin spent his later years with Lockhart Smith at their home in Coleshill, Oxfordshire. He died there on 8 March 2016, aged 90. While the cause of his death was not immediately disclosed, his biographer, Kenneth Womack, later attributed it to complications from stomach cancer. He was buried near All Saints Church in Coleshill. A memorial service was held on 11 May at St Martin-in-the-Fields, attended by, among others, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono, Olivia Harrison, Elton John, Bernard Cribbins, and former colleagues.

From Wikipedia’s article on George Martin (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Awards

  • 1999Rock and Roll Hall of Fame10
  • 1996Grammy Trustees Award10
  • 1989honorary doctor of the Berklee College of Music10 11
  • 1968Grammy Award for Album of the Year for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band10
  • Date not recordedCommander of the Order of the British Empire10
  • Date not recordedJames Joyce Awards10
  • Date not recordedKnight Bachelor10

Sources

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