“Eleanor Rigby” by The Beatles

"Eleanor Rigby" is the Beatles leaving the beat group behind altogether, a song from Revolver, released in 1966 and paired on a double A-side single with "Yellow Submarine". George Martin, producing, arranged it for a double string quartet, the violins of Tony Gilbert, Jurgen Hess, Sidney Sax and John Sharpe, the violas of Stephen Shingles and John Underwood, and the cellos of Norman Jones and Derek Simpson, sawing away like a heartbeat under stress. Paul McCartney sings lead, with John Lennon and George Harrison behind him, and the words sketch lonely lives with a novelist's chill.

It's credited to Lennon and McCartney, but it's one of the few songs the two later argued over, and witnesses including Martin and Pete Shotton have backed McCartney's claim. It went to number one in Australia, Belgium, Canada and New Zealand.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.