The Beatles have had more number-one albums on the British charts and sold more singles in the UK than any other act. According to the RIAA, they are the best-selling band in the United States, with 177 million certified units. In 2008, the group topped Billboard magazine's list of the all-time most successful "Hot 100" artists. As of 2013, they hold the record for most number-one hits on the Hot 100 chart with 20. They have received 7 Grammy Awards, an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score and 15 Ivor Novello Awards. Collectively included in Time magazine's compilation of the 20th century's 100 most influential people, the Beatles are the best-selling band in history, with EMI Records estimating sales of over one billion units. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the Beatles as the best artist of all-time.
This is the third in a series of 20 caches to celebrate the Beatles' twenty U.S. number-one singles.
"I Want to Hold Your Hand" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, and recorded in October 1963, it was the first Beatles record to be made using four-track equipment.
With advance orders exceeding one million copies in the United Kingdom, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" would ordinarily have gone straight to the top of the British record charts on its day of release (29 November 1963) had it not been blocked by the group's first million seller "She Loves You", the Beatles' previous UK single, which was having a resurgent spell in the top position following intense media coverage of the group. Taking two weeks to dislodge its predecessor, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" stayed at number one for five weeks and remained in the UK top fifty for twenty-one weeks in total. It was also the group's first American number one, entering the Billboard Hot 100 chart on 18 January 1964 at number forty-five and starting the British invasion of the American music industry. By 1 February it held the number one spot — for seven weeks — before being replaced by "She Loves You", a reverse scenario of what had occurred in Britain, and remained in the US charts for a total of fifteen weeks. "I Want to Hold Your Hand" became the Beatles' best-selling single worldwide.
The song is in the key of G and opens on "I'll tell you" with a D-B, B-D melody note drop and rise over a I (G) chord. Controversy exists over the landmark chord that Lennon stated McCartney hit on the piano while they were composing the song. Marshall considers it is the minor vi (Em) chord (the third chord in the I-V7-vi (G-D7-Em) progression). Everett is of the same opinion. Pedler claims, however, that more surprising is the melody note drop from B to F# against a III7 (B7) chord on "understand." Music theorists are divided over whether this chord is a iii (Bm), a B major, or a B7 or even a B5 power chord with no major or minor defining third.
Although it is said that Brian Epstein had encouraged Lennon and McCartney to write a song to appeal to American listeners this has been denied by George Martin. McCartney had recently moved into 57 Wimpole Street, London, where he was living as a guest of Dr. Richard and Margaret Asher, whose daughter, actress Jane Asher, had become McCartney’s girlfriend after meeting him earlier in the year. This location briefly became Lennon and McCartney’s new writing base, taking over from McCartney’s Forthlin Road home in Liverpool. Margaret Asher taught the oboe in the "small, rather stuffy music room" in the basement where Lennon and McCartney sat at the piano and composed "I Want to Hold Your Hand".
In September 1980, Lennon told Playboy magazine: "We wrote a lot of stuff together, one on one, eyeball to eyeball. Like in 'I Want to Hold Your Hand,' I remember when we got the chord that made the song. We were in Jane Asher's house, downstairs in the cellar playing on the piano at the same time. And we had, 'Oh you-u-u/ got that something...' And Paul hits this chord [E minor] and I turn to him and say, 'That's it!' I said, 'Do that again!' In those days, we really used to absolutely write like that — both playing into each other's noses." In 1994, McCartney agreed with Lennon's description of the circumstances surrounding the composition of "I Want to Hold Your Hand," saying: "'Eyeball to eyeball' is a very good description of it. That's exactly how it was. 'I Want to Hold Your Hand' was very co-written. It was our big number one; the one that would eventually break us in America."
"I Want To Hold Your Hand"
Oh yeah, I'll tell you something
I think you'll understand
When I say that something
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
Oh, please, say to me
You'll let me be your man
and please, say to me
You'll let me hold your hand
Now let me hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
And when I touch you i feel happy, inside
It's such a feeling
That my love
I can't hide
I can't hide
I can't hide
Yeah you, got that something
I think you'll understand
When I say that something
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
And when I touch you I feel happy, inside
It's such a feeling
That my love
I can't hide
I can't hide
I can't hide
Yeah you, got that something
I think you'll understand
When I say that something
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your hand
I wanna hold your ha-a-a-a-a-a-and
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Congratulations to zzbob for FTF!