Michelle

"[Paul] and I were staying somewhere and he walked in and hummed the first few bars, with the words...and he says, "Where do I go from here?" I had been listening to Nina Simone--I think it was "I put a Spell On You." There was a line in it that went... "I love you, I love you, I love you." That's waht made me think of the middle eight for "Michelle": 'I love you, I love you, I l-o-ove you.'"

-John Lennon, Playboy

"Michelle" is song by The Beatles, credited Lennon/McCartney. It appeared on the Rubber Soul album and one of the few Beatles songs that includes French lyrics.

Paul couldn't play bass or guitar with his left hand, so he learned to play with his right hand. Paul couldn't write music notation, so he played what he composed and had somebody else transcribe it. Paul couldn't speak French, so he turned to a French teacher to translate into French the lyrics he wanted to include in a song, resulting in one of the Beatles' most beautiful ballads.

Amazing what you can do when you can't do something, eh?

Nothin' you can do that can't be done, indeed

Recording
November 3, 1965, 2:30-11:30 pm-The afternoon was spent filling four tracks with the rhythm track. Then, this was mixed down onto three tracks so they could fill the fourth track with overdubbed vocals and guitar. Occasional EMI tape operator Jerry Boys, on listening to playback of the song as they were working on it that night, said: "I stood there quite spellbound. It sounded lovely. George [Martin] asked me what I thought of the Beatles singing a song with French lyrics and I got the impression that with me being a young chap he was sounding me out, perhaps because they weren't too sure themselves. I said it sounded very pleasant, which it certainly did!"*

November 9, 1965- Mono mixing (unused) and stereo mixing.

November 15, 1965- Mono mixing.

Credits
Paul McCartney: Lead vocals and bass guitar

John Lennon: Backing vocal and acoustic guitar

George Harrison: Backing vocal and acoustic guitar

Ringo Starr: Drums

Links

 * Lyrics at LyricWiki