Once Upon A Long Ago

Album This song officially appears on the All The Best! (UK version) Official album.

Timeline This song has been officially released in 1987

Timeline This song has been written (or started being written) in 1987 (Paul McCartney was 45 years old)

Song facts

I’ve done some recording with Phil Ramone recently and this was something that came out of those sessions that we liked. The sentiment is ‘times remembered’: once upon a long ago…things were so much simpler then…It’s got some nice bits in it, I think it’s quite a haunting thing. I feel quite good about it.

Paul McCartney, from Club Sandwich N°47/48, Spring 1988

From Wikipedia:

“Once Upon a Long Ago” is a Paul McCartney song, released as his fortieth single on 16 November 1987, as part of his compilation All the Best!, released two weeks before the single. The track was produced by Phil Ramone and mixed by George Martin, and features violin by Nigel Kennedy.

It was reported in a 2011 biography that the origin of this song is with the film The Princess Bride. McCartney was approached by Director Rob Reiner to compose a couple of songs and the incidental music for the film. Reiner rejected as “too sentimental” the two songs Paul submitted: “Once Upon a Long Ago” and “Beautiful Night” and contracted with Mark Knopfler to complete the soundtrack.

Recording

Originally it was intended that this song would be a Duet between McCartney and Freddie Mercury. The two had become friends following Live Aid and McCartney wrote the song with Mercury in mind. Mercury however was inundated with work, both Solo and with Queen and was also in the advanced stages of AIDS and McCartney very understandably allowed Mercury to depart from the project .The track was recorded at Hog Hill Studio on March 11 and 12, 1987 with overdubs added in Abbey Road in July. During this session, a full orchestra was overdubbed as well as instrumental contributions by Stan Sulzmann (sax), Nigel Kennedy (violin), and Adrian Brett (flute).

Release and charts

The song was released in four versions. Two different 12″ singles feature “long” and “extended” versions (mixed by George Martin and Peter Henderson, respectively); the 7″ single and the CD single (McCartney’s first) features an edit of the long version and a b-side from each the two 12″ singles, as well as “Back on My Feet“, a b-side for all four iterations; and the album version featured on All the Best! contains an alternate ending. “Back on My Feet” was also the first released song from the songwriting collaboration between McCartney and Elvis Costello. Both 12″ and CD singles also featured songs from yet to be released McCartney’s cover album Choba B CCCP.

“Once Upon a Long Ago” reached number ten in the United Kingdom Singles Chart, McCartney’s last Top 10 in his homeland until the release of “FourFiveSeconds” in 2015. The single was not released in the United States nor included on the US version of All the Best!, although it did appear on the longer UK/Canada version. The song has remained unavailable on any US released album, although it is a bonus track on the 1993 UK remastered version of Press to Play – the 1993 remastered Paul McCartney Collection has never been released in the US.

Once Upon A Video

Along with the single and the All the Best!-album there was also released an 18-minute VHS for sale called Once Upon A Video, consisting of four music videoes:

1. Once Upon A Long Ago
2. Stranglehold
3. Pretty Little Head
4. We All Stand Together – the music video was an edit of the songpart from the movie Rupert and the Frog Song

We All Stand Together was included on the UK/Canada-release of All the Best! along with Once Upon A Long Ago.

Paul had heard me on a record I made playing Duke Ellington and Bartok. Apparently he asked George Martin if I was available …It was great fun to do. Paul’s contribution to music has been phenomenal, but he’s still got the appetite… It’s just art for art’s sake.

Nigel Kennedy, about his contribution to “Once Upon Along Ago”, from Club Sandwich N°46, Winter 1987

It was quite a laugh. We recorded at Abbey Road and I’d just been in there the day before doing some concerto with Andre Previn… With Previn, we already knew what we were going to do when we went in there. But with McCartney he just said ‘Play’ and it was up to me to lock into his personality and what he was saying

Nigel Kennedy, about the session for “Once Upon Along Ago”, from Club Sandwich N°46, Winter 1987

Last updated on March 22, 2020

Latest concerts where Once Upon A Long Ago has been played