10 Amazing Songs Written In 30 Minutes Or Less

One of the most famous songs by one of the most famous music groups of all time was written in… less than a minute?

According to Paul McCartney, he conceived Yesterday in its entirety during a dream he had one night while sleeping in his room at the Wimpole Street home of his then-girlfriend Jane Asher. Upon waking up, he rushed to a piano and quickly played it through in order not to forget it.

“I have no idea how I wrote that,” Macca reflected. “ I just woke up one morning and it was in my head. I didn’t believe it for about two weeks.”

Now, the early period of The Beatles’ career is full of relatively simple songs that could conceivably be written in a short time. Their debut album, Please Please Me, was famously written and recorded in a single day, but since it was basically full of cover songs it is not that surprising.

So, to write Yesterday in under a minute is quite a remarkable achievement, whether it happened in a dream or not. Some people have pointed out the song’s similarities to other works, such as Georgia On My Mind by Ray Charles, or Answer Me, My Love by Nat King Cole and Frankie Laine. Since those songs were fairly popular at the time, it could have been that they were just floating around in McCartney’s subconsciousness when he came up with Yesterday. Either way, it doesn’t take anything away from the fact that it remains one of Fab Four’s most beloved tracks.