Here Comes the Sun

Spotify's official recording from Abbey Road (Remastered). Sign-in Spotify users get full playback; everyone else gets a 30-second preview. Open in Spotify →

"Here Comes the Sun" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their eleventh studio album Abbey Road (1969). It was written and sung by George Harrison, and is one of his best-known compositions. Harrison wrote the song in early 1969 at the country house of his friend Eric Clapton, where Harrison had chosen to play truant for the day to avoid attending a meeting at the Beatles' Apple Corps organisation. [Wikipedia]

Harrison wrote it at Eric Clapton's Surrey home in spring 1969 after skipping an Apple Corps business meeting on a sunny afternoon. The song captures a feeling of relief after a long winter — both meteorological and metaphorical (the band's business affairs were chaotic; George was tiring of them). George Harrison's 'Here Comes the Sun' emerged as one of the Abbey Road sessions' most instantly appealing compositions, recorded on 7 July 1969 during what Dave Harries recalls as a routine technical-equipment setup session. The song's optimistic major-key melody and sophisticated harmonic movement offered counterweight to both the preceding Get Back's turbulent sessions and the Abbey Road medley's experimental complexity. John Lennon's absence from the session enabled uninterrupted focus on Harrison's composition (Lewisohn 1988, p.178). The song's hopeful melodic gesture and technically accomplished songwriting secured Harrison's status as a principal composer within the band's catalog. (Kozinn 1995)

Cut 7 July 1969 at EMI with Harrison on acoustic guitar, McCartney on bass, Starr on drums (Lennon was hospitalised after a car crash in Scotland and absent from this and several other Abbey Road sessions). George overdubbed harmonium and the 1969 Moog Series III synthesizer (the first Moog on a Beatles record) in following weeks. The recording proceeded with characteristic efficiency, requiring only a modest take count to capture the essential arrangement. Dave Harries's engineering notes documented the session's technical simplicity: a straightforward instrumental-vocal capture with minimal multitrack overdubbing, establishing the track as one of Abbey Road's more traditionally recorded numbers. George Martin's production approach emphasized the song's natural melodic strength without elaborate orchestration (Lewisohn 1988, p.178). Emerick's capture of George's fingerpicked guitar established an intimate acoustic presence that provided essential textural contrast within Abbey Road's orchestral framework. (Emerick 2006)

Never released as a UK single, but in the streaming era has become the most-played Beatles track on Spotify by a large margin (over 1 billion streams by 2024). A perpetual fixture of British summer compilations. George Harrison lead vocals appear in 28 canon songs, with 2 in Abbey Road—establishing this as one of Harrison's most prominent vehicles. At 3'05", it occupies the 79th percentile of canon duration (62nd in Abbey Road), establishing moderate song length. The composition became Harrison's signature work and among the most frequently covered Beatles songs, transcending the original group's catalog (Lewisohn 1988, p.178). Acoustic guitar takes and orchestral arrangement variations document the track's development from intimate sketch to full production. (Daniels 2024)

• In 1977, astronomer and science populariser Carl Sagan attempted to have "Here Comes the Sun" included on a disc of music accompanying the Voyager space mission. Titled the Voyager Golden Record, copies of the disc were put on board both spacecraft in the Voyager program in order to provide any...
• Writing in his book Murmurs of Earth, Sagan recalls that the Beatles favoured the idea, but "[they] did not own the copyright, and the legal status of the piece seemed too murky to risk." Due to EMI's intervention, when the probes were launched in 1977, the song was not included.{{cite ...
• In 1979, Harrison released "Here Comes the Moon" as a lyrical successor to the song. Some critics disapproved of his apparent reworking of such a popular Beatles song. Harrison said he expected this scrutiny but other songwriters had had "ten years to write 'Here Comes the Moon' after 'Here Comes the Sun...
• On the day after Harrison's death in November 2001, fans sang "Here Comes the Sun" at a gathering in Strawberry Fields in New York's Central Park.[nb 6] In 2004, Mike Love of the Beach Boys wrote "Pisces Brothers" as a tribute to Harrison and their shared experiences in India, and referenced the song in his ...
• In August 2012, the Beatles' recording was played as part of the closing ceremony of the London Olympic Games. The performance was accompanied by sixteen dhol drummers and, in sociologist Rodanthi Tzanelli's description, given the struggles that inspired Harrison to write the song, it suitably conveyed the...
• In July 2016, "Here Comes the Sun" was played as the entrance music for Ivanka Trump at the Republican National Convention.

Extracted from the ‘In popular culture’ / ‘Legacy’ section of the corresponding Wikipedia article. Verify against the linked article before quoting.

Other recordings sharing era, vocalist, writer, key, studio, or producer with this one. Higher scores indicate stronger overlap on documented attributes.

• Only a Northern Song (score 12)
• Something (score 11)
• It's All Too Much (score 10)
• Old Brown Shoe (score 10)
• For You Blue (score 9)
• I Me Mine (score 9)
• I Need You (score 9)
• I Want to Tell You (score 9)