Paul McCartney Wrote Yesterday in His Sleep
McCartney woke up in 1964 with a finished melody — and spent weeks assuming he had stolen it from someone.
In June 1964, Paul McCartney woke up in a guest room at Jane Asher's family home in London with a complete melody in his head. He sat down at an upright piano by the bed and played it through, certain he must have heard it somewhere before.
For weeks, he played the tune for other musicians and asked the same question: is this yours? Nobody claimed it. He kept the melody on hold under the working title "Scrambled Eggs" — actual placeholder lyrics he sang to himself — until he was confident enough to pitch it as an original to John Lennon.
The song eventually recorded as "Yesterday" came out on the Help! album in August 1965. It featured only McCartney's voice and a string quartet — no other Beatles, which was itself unusual for the time. George Martin arranged the strings in an afternoon.
The BBC initially refused to add it to its playlist, considering a solo Beatle track commercially unfair to other artists. It became the most-played song on American radio in 1965 anyway.
By 1986, the Guinness Book of Records had counted more than 1,600 cover versions; the number now sits above 2,200, making it the most covered song in recorded history. McCartney has described the dream-origin story in multiple interviews, including a 1984 Playboy piece, noting that the ease of its arrival made him distrust it for years.
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