Ticket to Ride: A Beatles Tribute

Swingle Singers | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 26, 2002)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Primarily A Cappella
• ASIN: B000063DFY
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #143,551 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Ticket To Ride

2. Penny Lane

3. Revolution

4. Day Tripper

5. Norwegian Wood

6. Birthday

7. Lady Madonna

8. Yesterday

9. Strawberry Fields Forever

10. Drive My Car

11. Blackbird/I Will

12. When I'm Sixty Four

13. The Fool On The Hill

14. All My Loving

15. I Am The Walrus

16. Goodnight

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An unusual Beatles tribute album, January 25, 2003

By 

Peter Durward Harris "Pete the music fan" (Leicester England) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Ticket to Ride: A Beatles Tribute (Audio CD)

I love the Beatles and their music, but I always felt that the songs were what set them apart from other groups. The diversity of tribute albums, crossing just about every genre of music, reinforces that belief. I sometimes broaden my musical horizons via Beatles tribute albums - it is a good way of trying something new which still has a base of familiarity. And so it was that I selected this CD. The first time I played it, I wasn't sure, but on the second play, I loved it.

Despite the inclusion of Yesterday, the songs are generally not the most frequently covered - Penny Lane, Revolution, Day tripper, Lady Madonna, Strawberry fields forever, Drive my car and I am the walrus are all well known, but how often do you come across covers of these songs?

The Swingle singers are made up of four men (two tenors, two bass) and four ladies (two sopranos, two altos). Their roots lie in jazz and classical music, but their a cappella style is very much their own. Classifying music is often difficult, but I wouldn't even begin to classify this. It's not the kind of music I would listen to very often, but it is one of those CD's that I choose from when I want something different to listen to.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars not imitations, but rather "variations" on songs of the Beatles, April 19, 2011

By 

Discophage (France) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Ticket to Ride: A Beatles Tribute (Audio CD)

In order to best enjoy this CD it is probably best to consider the Swingles' arrangements less as "imitations" of the Beatles, than as "variations" on songs of the Beatles, something like what Jazz people do when they pick up an old standard and provide their own version, whose character can be dramatically different from the original.

So, yes, the character of the Beatles' songs is changed and sometimes quite dramatically - although you never loose sight of the originals, of course. Usually the Swingles' versions for a cappella octet aren't as adrenalin-filled and raging as those of the Beatles, and in the "sad songs", like Yesterday, they may not be as wistfully sad. Lady Madonna is less driven and hectic, but more sensuously "Gospel" than the original.

But the arrangements and realizations provide their own rewards: they are harmonically richer, with more ambiguity, melodies shared between different voices and sometimes tossed between them, and with vocal counterpoint added. There's the unique sensuousness of the vocal timbres, the fascination of the vocal percussion - soon the Swingles would be recording Beauty and the Beatbox with the collaboration of Shlomo the Human Beatbox, see my review), and some nice touches in the arrangement, like the obsessive "frrrap ! frrrap ! " in Birthday, the "Ku-tah!" in Lady Madonna, or the concert of vocal honks that opens "Drive my Car" as in Ligeti's opera "Le Grand Macabre". Track 11's arrangement brilliantly mixes "Blackbird" and "I will" - why not. (well, here' why not: I far prefer "Blackbird" and "I will" kind of ruins it). In some tracks some voices sounds as if they were electronically re-processed (as in Revolution, The Walrus or Strawberry Fields), as they are in the originals. There are nice antiphonal effects in Strawberry Fields.

So, sure, this is for "A capella" enthusiasts. Some fans of the Beatles (obviously not all!) might also enjoy it, especially if they happen to be "A Capella" enthusiasts.

4 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars New Christy Minstrels make Elevator music on LSD!, September 27, 2005

By 

AlphaKid42 "alphakid42" (Alameda, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ticket to Ride: A Beatles Tribute (Audio CD)

Perhaps the strangest album ever recorded next to Lou Reed's machine metal music (2 vinyl discs of amplifier feedback).

The singers harmonize as well as the 5th Dimension, the Association, or Peter, Paul and Mary but the results are anything but delicious. I mean how can you make a song like Revolution or I am the Walrus ... full of gut-wrenching emotion into something with no feeling whatsoever (other than nausia)? Well, take a listen ... these guys did it!