Recording and mixing "Savoy Truffle", "Piggies", "Don't Pass Me By", "Good Night"

About

The Beatles had recorded the basic track of George Harrison’s “Savoy Truffle” on October 3, and the first overdubs had been added on October 5. On this day, from 3 pm to 6 pm, the work on “Savoy Truffle” continued with the addition of some saxophone overdubs.

Chris Thomas had written a brass arrangement, that was played by six saxophonists (three baritone and three tenor), who were all veterans of the British jazz scene.

George Martin suggested that I score “Savoy Truffle” for saxophones. I must say that I found it a real chore.

Chris Thomas – From “The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions”, Mark Lewisohn

The session men were playing really well – there’s nothing like a good brass section letting rip – and it sounded fantastic. But having got this really nice sound George turned to Ken Scott and said ‘Right, I want to distort it’. So I had to plug-up two high-gain amplifiers which overloaded and deliberately introduced a lot of distortion, completely tearing the sound to pieces and making it dirty. The musicians came up to the control room to listen to a playback and George said to them ‘Before you listen I’ve got to apologise for what I’ve done to your beautiful sound. Please forgive me – but it’s the way I want it!’ I don’t think they particularly enjoyed hearing their magnificent sound screwed up quite so much but they realised that this was what George wanted, and that it was their job to provide it.

Brian Gibson, technical engineer – From “The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions”, Mark Lewisohn

“Savoy Truffle” would be completed on October 14.

The rest of the day, from 6 pm to midnight, was spent mixing “Piggies“, “Don’t Pass Me By” and “Good Night“. The three songs were mixed in mono and stereo, and all those mixes would be released on the White Album.

In terms of variations between mono and stereo versions:

• For “Piggies“: “The only noticeable differences between the mono and stereo mixes were the different placements of the pig sound effects that were previously compiled by John, which were added at this stage, and a louder acoustic guitar in the mono mix” (from beatlesebooks.com)
• For “Don’t Pass Me By“: “Only one mono mix and one stereo mix were needed to get the song to the releasable state, them having to tack on the piano edit pieces for each, as well as mix out the fiddle playing until the end of the first verse and edit out the repeated first verse toward the end of the song. And, as noted above, they chose a different closing segment of Jack Fallon’s fiddle playing for the stereo mix, seemingly an isolated performance taken directly from one of the song’s choruses. The mono version was purposely speeded up which is especially noticed with Ringo’s higher pitched vocals. There is a little more fiddle playing throughout the mono version as well.” (from beatlesebooks.com)
• For “Good Night“: “They only needed one try at getting a stereo mix, this time deciding to fade in the introduction unlike the mono which just comes in at full volume” (from beatlesebooks.com)

Last updated on September 12, 2021

Songs recorded

Staff

Musicians on "Savoy Truffle"

Harry Klein:

Baritone saxophone

Art Ellefson:

Tenor saxophone

Danny Moss:

Tenor saxophone

Derek Collins:

Tenor saxophone

Ronnie Ross:

Baritone saxophone

Bernard George:

Baritone saxophone

Production staff

George Martin:

Producer

Ken Scott:

Engineer

John Smith:

Second Engineer