Quote Originally Posted by walrus View Post
Beatles may have been a bit overrated. George Martin was producing commercials and odds and ends prior to the Beatles. I’m not minimizing Martin, he was the fifth Beatles, but he did not make the Beatles. Sorry freedom I now have to ask for u to be banned as well. Martin was a Beatle, he did not make the Beatles. Let it Be was a fine album and Martin was not involved in it.
I'm not saying Martin made the Beatles, but he added an element of sophistication that they needed in order to succeed. He was a capable musician and played piano far better than any Beatle - listen to Not a Second Time and In My Life.

Martin produced recordings for many other successful artists: Cilla Black, Gerry & The Pacemakers, Billy J. Kramer & the Dakotas, America, Jeff Beck, John Williams, Neil Sedaka, Kenny Rogers, Cheap Trick, Elton John, Little River Band, and Celine Dion.

Let it Be was produced by Phil Spector, a crazy man but one of the most capable and successful music producers in the USA. John Lennon's two Spector-produced albums were much better than the next two which were made with a lesser producer, and Spector did great work with George on All Things Must Pass. George's later albums didn't sound nearly as good as the first.

When Martin and Paul worked together, the results were very good. Tug of War, Pipes of Peace and Flaming Pie, were three of McCartney four best albums. Martin also worked with Paul on his first #1 single, Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey.

From wiki:

Martin's more formal musical expertise helped fill the gaps between the Beatles' unrefined talent and the sound which distinguished them from other groups, which eventually made them successful. Most of the Beatles' orchestral arrangements and instrumentation were written or performed by Martin, as well as frequent keyboard parts on the early records, in collaboration with the less musically experienced band.

It was Martin's idea to score a string quartet accompaniment for "Yesterday" against McCartney's initial reluctance. Martin played the song in the style of Bach to show McCartney the voicings that were available. Another example is the song "Penny Lane", which featured a piccolo trumpet solo that was requested by McCartney after hearing the instrument on a BBC broadcast. McCartney hummed the melody that he wanted, and Martin notated it for David Mason, the classically trained trumpeter.

Martin's work as an arranger was used for many Beatles recordings. For "Eleanor Rigby," he scored and conducted a strings-only accompaniment inspired by Bernard Herrmann. On a Canadian speaking tour in 2007, Martin said that his "Eleanor Rigby" score was influenced by Herrmann's score for the Alfred Hitchcock thriller Psycho. For "Strawberry Fields Forever", he and recording engineer Geoff Emerick turned two very different takes into a single master through careful use of vari-speed and editing. For "I Am the Walrus", he provided a quirky and original arrangement for brass, violins, cellos, and the Mike Sammes Singers vocal ensemble. On "In My Life", he played a speeded-up baroque piano solo. He worked with McCartney to implement the orchestral climax in "A Day in the Life", and he and McCartney shared conducting duties the day that it was recorded.

Martin contributed integral parts to other songs, including the piano in "Lovely Rita", the harpsichord in songs such as "Because" and "Fixing a Hole"; the old steam organ and tape loop arrangement that created the Pablo Fanque circus atmosphere that Lennon requested on "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" (both Martin and Lennon played steam organ parts for this song), and the orchestration in "Good Night". Martin was in demand as an independent arranger and producer by the time of The White Album, so the Beatles were left to produce various tracks by themselves.

Martin composed and arranged the score for the Beatles' film Yellow Submarine and the James Bond film Live and Let Die, for which Paul McCartney wrote and sang the title song. He helped arrange Paul's first American # 1 single "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey".