College course helps millennials understand the vast influence of the Beatles
After ignominiously becoming the first college basketball team to lose a twenty-point lead in NCAA Tournament history, the University of Cincinnati was a solemn place to attend classes that following day in March. Spirits were obviously low, as the number two seeded Bearcats ended up losing to Nevada and failed to reach the Sweet Sixteen once again.
Despite the dark mood and cold drizzle on campus, a quarter of a thousand students had a reason to shout a good sunny day. Right there in the Zimmer Auditorium, it was one of the sexiest classes in the entire country, a popular elective called Beatles Music.
While the Fan Four had parted ways nearly forty years before most of the students were born, they seem wowed by the biweekly performances. The course program is dictated by the chronology of the various albums, from Meet The Beatles to Let It Be.
The course teacher is Roger Klug, a multi-instrumentalist whose recording career began in 1980. At some point during each Music Of The Beatles session, Klug demonstrates a song on his guitar or on the electric piano that he keeps close to the lecturn.
For example, during a lesson that focused on the White Album, Klug replicated how John Lennon came up with the piano intro to “Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da.” Klug later showed how Lennon on Julia “used a guitar technique called Travis picking, which he had learned from Donovan during his highly publicized trip to India.
As fascinating as his musicianship is Klug’s vast knowledge of that famous British quartet, including various anecdotes of how certain songs originated. Paul McCartney came up with the title “Why we don’t do it on the road” after seeing two monkeys attacking on a street in India.
Most Fab Four fans know that McCartney wrote “Hey Jude” for Lennon’s son Julian, but Professor Klug provided even more background on that number one hit. When first shown the lyrics, Lennon thought McCartney had written it in support of the controversial relationship between Lennon and Yoko Ono.
Another accessory that Klug somehow has at his disposal is a program that allows him to mute all instruments except one, allowing students to appreciate the talents of the individuals in the band. In an early session, Krug let students listen to only Lennon’s powerful electric guitar on “I Want To Hold Your Hand,” and during a more recent class he highlighted Lennon’s bass work on “Helter Skelter.”
Klug frequently points to the direct influence of The Beatles on music in the decades that followed, as well as on all genres. At the end of one session, he displayed on the screen a large photo of a Jay Z album familiar to most of the students present, the title of which referred directly to The Beatles. That rap album, as Klug pointed out, was called The Black Album.