| "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You" | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by The Beatles | ||||||||||||
| from the album A Hard Day's Night | ||||||||||||
| A-side | "I'll Cry Instead" | |||||||||||
| Released | 20 August 1964 (Single) 10 June 1964 (mono album) 10 July 1964 (stereo album) |
|||||||||||
| Format | 7" | |||||||||||
| Recorded | Abbey Road Studios 1 March 1964 |
|||||||||||
| Genre | Rock and roll | |||||||||||
| Length | 1:58 | |||||||||||
| Label | Capitol (US) | |||||||||||
| Writer(s) | Lennon–McCartney | |||||||||||
| Producer | George Martin | |||||||||||
| The Beatles singles chronology | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
"I'm Happy Just to Dance with You" is a song written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney[1] and recorded by The Beatles for the film soundtrack to A Hard Day's Night.
Contents |
It was written specifically for George Harrison to sing at a time when he lacked the confidence to compose his own material. Years later, McCartney described it as a "formula song",[1] and Lennon said, "I would never have sung it myself."[2]
Structurally, it features hectic Bo Diddley rhythm and busy banjo style guitar playing in juxtaposition with Harrison's vocal. Its composers give it an unpredictable choice of chord (augmenting the B7th on "I'm happy just to dance with you") right at the crux of its title, jarring the chorus. The song is also unique in that it begins not with a verse or chorus but with the last four bars of the bridge.[3]
The Beatles recorded "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You" on a Sunday, the first time they had used Abbey Road Studios on other than a normal work day.[2]
The group also recorded a version for the BBC's From Us to You radio show. The session took place on 17 July 1964 at the BBC Paris Studio in London, and was first broadcast on 3 August that year.[4]
Anne Murray included a cover of "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You" on her 1980 album Somebody's Waiting. Murray had had some success in previous years covering other Beatles songs such as "You Won't See Me" and "Day Tripper." Unlike the Beatles' original, Murray's version of "I'm Happy Just to Dance with You" is an adult-contemporary ballad.
Murray's version of the song was released as a single in mid-1980, reaching #64 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #23 on the Billboard country chart in 1980.
|
|||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||