Paul McCartney wrote Blackbird for The Beatles’ 1968 double album, The Beatles (often referred to as “the White Album”). It’s not the standout track on the 55-year-old album of Beyonce, Blackbii. Cowboy Carter, the starlet’s “country album,” ought to cover it. Beginning with the line “blackbird singing in the dead of night,” Beyonce’s song touches on two topics that are important to her: female freedom and civil rights.
McCartney composed it in remembrance of the Little Rock Nine of 1957, who faced bigotry at their all-white high school. The incident, which attracted notice worldwide, served as a test case for the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education prohibition on school segregation.
To prevent students from entering, Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus summoned the national guard. Federal forces escorted McCartney, who, along with nine other early civil rights heroes, gained global recognition.
The Beatles’ transcendental meditation vacation in Rishikesh, India, served as the inspiration for the song. One morning, McCartney was inspired by the call of the blackbird. Later, utilizing chord progressions from Bach’s Bourrée in E minor, which he and George Harrison had learned as children, he expanded the idea while strumming an acoustic guitar in the kitchen of his Scottish farm.
“I was aware of the civil rights issues that were occurring during the 1960s, specifically in Alabama, Mississippi, and Little Rock,” he told GQ in 2018. “I wanted to write something to offer hope to people who are struggling.” That’s why I wrote Blackbird.
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A few weeks after Martin Luther King’s assassination, McCartney wrote the song, specifically focusing on the symbolic and allegorical opening phrase. McCartney stated to GQ, “I was thinking of a black girl going through this—you know, now is your time to arise, set yourself free, and take these broken wings.”
This was a nod to the English proverb “a bird is a girl” from the 1960s. The phrase “All your life, you were only waiting for this moment to be free” would strike a chord with students in Little Rock. (Prior to his 1980 murder, John Lennon concealed the “important” lyric he added to the song.)
After 32 takes, McCartney liked the guitar, tapping foot, and effects tape recording with the blackbird noises. Following her visit in 2016, McCartney tweeted, “Excellent to meet two of the Little Rock Nine—pioneers of the civil rights movement and inspiration for Blackbird.” In 2016, she got to know Thelma Mothershed-Wair and Elizabeth Eckford.
Before Beyonce, several musicians covered Blackbird. Bill Preston, Dandy Warhols, Dave Grohl, CSN, and Sarah McLachlan all gave it a shot. Her spiritual performance, with its delicate strings, features Black American country performers Brittney Spencer, Tanner Adell, Tiera Kennedy, and Reyna Roberts.
These musicians battle to break into Nashville’s gate-kept scene, which keeps black and female performers out. Beyonce revitalized this timeless, yet always current, masterpiece by introducing the song and its historical relevance to her sizable, mostly youthful audience.
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