Look (Song for Children)

"Look" (labelled on session tapes as "I Ran")^[1] is a song by the American rock band The Beach Boys, written by Brian Wilson and intended by him as a potential track for the band's aborted Smile concept album. Due to lost tapes and scarce information, the recording of "Look" exists today only as an instrumental piece. It was later rerecorded under the title "Song for Children" for Wilson's 2004 presentation of Smile and rewritten with new lyrics by Van Dyke Parks.

Composition

The song was to be entitled "Look", but during later vocal overdubs was marked as "I Ran" on session tape boxes. The tapes in these boxes remain lost, so it is unknown what the vocal arrangement of the song consisted of in 1966.^[1] An explanation for the title "I Ran" can be attributed as the answer to a repeated lyrical question occurring in "Cabin Essence" ("Who ran the iron horse?").

Placing emphasis on glockenspiel, clavichord, and pounding floor toms, the instrumental track bears some melodic and stylistic similarities to the penultimate choral fugato of the recent Wilson composition "Good Vibrations". "Look" was attempted early on in Smile sessions, being the second song worked on after "Good Vibrations"—possibly having branched from the composition as a byproduct of its arduous gestation.^[2] A prominent section of the song makes reference to the iconic opening of the American ragtime piece "Twelfth Street Rag",^[2] as per the album's persistent Americana theme.^[3] After vocal overdubs were recorded on October 13, 1966 (1966-10-13), the track was abandoned.^[4]

According to Darian Sahanaja on its place in Wilson's 2004 Smile performances: "I was moving things around in Pro Tools, putting things together to show Brian. I dropped 'Wonderful' next to 'Look', and we listened to it. Brian's eyes lit up, and he said 'That's it! That's how we'll do it!'"^[5] Van Dyke Parks later supplied lyrics to be sung in overlapping harmony vocals to further establish connections with other tracks on the album, especially those within the second movement, and it was renamed from "Look" to "Song For Children". In this version, the "Twelfth Street Rag" section is not performed. "Song for Children" served as the link between "Wonderful" and "Child Is Father of the Man", thus being the second track of the album's second movement.^[2]

For The Smile Sessions, vocals from The Beach Boys' 1971 recording of "Surf's Up" were digitally mixed into the track similarly to how they were arranged in Brian Wilson Presents Smile.

Covers

In 2009 Rufus Wainwright covered Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks' 2004 "Song for Children" arrangement for the charity album War Child Presents Heroes as a medley with another track from the Smile catalog, "Wonderful" (following closely with Wilson's 2004 revision).

References

• Lambert, Philip (2007). Inside the Music of Brian Wilson: the Songs, Sounds, and Influences of the Beach Boys' Founding Genius. Continuum. ISBN 978-0-8264-1876-0.