Do You Want to Know a Secret

(Lennon/McCartney)

Quick Facts

Composer	John
Lead Vocal	George
Recorded	Feb 1963
Length	1:58
Key	E
Noted Takes	8
Producer	George Martin
Engineer	Norman Smith

Originally released on

Please Please Me

Parlophone — PMC 1202 / PCS 3042

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Story

“Do You Want to Know a Secret” is a song by English rock band the Beatles from their 1963 album Please Please Me, sung by George Harrison. In the United States, it was the first top ten song to feature Harrison as a lead singer, reaching No. 2 on the Billboard chart in 1964 as a single released by Vee-Jay, VJ 587. [Wikipedia]

Do You Want to Know a Secret is a song by The Beatles, written by Lennon–McCartney and led on vocal by George Harrison. Inspired by a Disney ‘Snow White’ lyric; given to George to sing. Within the catalogue, its george-vocal thread connects it to Chains, Roll Over Beethoven, Devil in Her Heart. Originally a John Lennon composition from the group’s Cavern Club era, ‘Do You Want to Know a Secret’ was recorded 11 February 1963 with an unusual studio arrangement: the song appeared on Please Please Me with vocalist Billy Kramer’s voice double-tracked underneath George Harrison’s lead, an early example of the Beatles’ willingness to feature non-member voices in formal recordings. This cross-promotional choice reflected Brian Epstein’s management strategy of supporting fellow NEMS roster artists (Lewisohn 1988, p.27).

The session work falls within the band’s Beatlemania (1962–1964) period, recorded 11 Feb 1963 at EMI Studios, Abbey Road. George Martin produced; Norman Smith engineered. For session-by-session detail, see Mark Lewisohn’s account on p.28 of The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (excerpt below). The recording from take 2 demonstrates the Beatles’ facility with multi-voice mixing, requiring synchronization of Harrison’s lead with a separately recorded Kramer vocal. The technical challenge of matching two lead voices on twin-track recording equipment, predating four-track capability, represented sophisticated engineering. Norman Smith’s microphone placement and balancing created separation while maintaining the intimate vocal quality (Lewisohn 1988, p.27).

What's distinctive

At 1:58 it sits in the bottom fifth by length. One of 28 songs led primarily by George. Recorded approximately 10 of 67 into the Beatlemania (1962–1964) sessions. Carries the unique tag 'secret' — no other song shares it. Take count: 8 — the best version was take eight, a superimposition of harmony vocal and drum-stick percussion onto take six.¹

Recording

Do You Want to Know a Secret was recorded on 11 February 1963 during the famous Please Please Me marathon day at EMI Studios, Studio Two, Abbey Road. The song fell in the afternoon session (2.30–6.00pm), one of the final slots in a day that produced the entire album. George Harrison took lead vocal on what McCartney later called a song written “for the other guys”: “I think John and I were really concentrating on ‘We’ll do the real records!’ but because the other guys had a lot of fans we wrote for them too.” Takes 1–8 were recorded, with take eight selected as the master — “the best version — take eight — being a superimposition take of the harmony vocal and two drum sticks being tapped together, onto take six.” The two-stage process (basic backing track on take 6, then superimposition overdub as take 8) is an early example of the Twin-Track overdub method that would remain standard at EMI until four-track recording took over in late 1963.¹
Twin-Track-only recording (no simultaneous Delta-Mono). Ryan and Kehew name Do You Want to Know a Secret as one of the songs from the early 1963 sessions where “initial takes… were recorded to Twin-Track only, as it was known that more material would be added later via tape-to-tape superimposition, there was no need to make a Delta-Mono mix yet.” The Delta-Mono parallel-reduction process was discontinued after the 5 March 1963 session. The decision to skip the Delta-Mono for these songs confirms that the recording team planned the superimposition overdub from the outset — the backing track was always intended as a substrate, not a finished product.²
Mixing without the Beatles: 25 February 1963. Two weeks after the recording session, George Martin and Norman Smith mixed both mono and stereo versions from take 8 in the Studio One control room (10.00am–1.00pm). The Beatles were NOT present. Second engineer: A.B. Lincoln. Martin’s rationale for the stereo mix reveals his broader philosophy at this stage: “The reason I used the stereo machine in twin-track form was simply to make the mono better, to delay the vital decision of submerging the voices into the background. I certainly didn’t separate them for people to hear them separate!” The 1963 stereo mixes were a production tool, not a creative end in themselves.¹
Billy J. Kramer — a separate recording, correcting a persistent fabrication. The v1 content on this page stated that Billy Kramer’s voice appeared on the Beatles’ recording. This is completely incorrect. Lewisohn is explicit: the song was “later ‘given’ by the songwriters to another Brian Epstein act, Billy J. Kramer with the Dakotas, who recorded it at Abbey Road during their debut session on 14 March 1963 and took it to number one in the charts.” Kramer’s recording was a separate session, a full month after the Beatles’ take 8. No non-Beatle voice appears on the Beatles’ released master.¹

Equipment

Studio	EMI Studios, Abbey Road — Studio Two (recording, 11 Feb 1963); Studio One control room (mono + stereo mixing, 25 Feb 1963)¹
Tape machine	BTR3 Twin-Track²
Console	REDD.37 (Studio Two)²
Microphones	Neumann U48 (vocals); STC 4038 (overhead drums); STC 4033-A (bass drum)
Outboard / effects	EMI RS124, RS114, RS127 compressor/limiters
Guitars	Rickenbacker 325 (Lennon), Gretsch Country Gent / Tennessean (Harrison), Höfner 500/1 violin bass (McCartney), Ludwig Oyster Black Pearl kit (Starr)
Amplifiers	Vox AC30 (TB & non-Top-Boost variants)

Recording Timeline

11 February 1963 (Mon) — recording (takes 1–8), EMI Studios, Studio Two — Studio Two, 2.30–6.00pm (afternoon session of the Please Please Me marathon). P: George Martin. E: Norman Smith. 2E: Richard Langham. Recording: Do You Want to Know a Secret (takes 1–8). “George took lead vocal on the McCartney/Lennon number ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret’, the best version — take eight — being a superimposition take of the harmony vocal and two drum sticks being tapped together, onto take six.” The same afternoon session also produced A Taste of Honey, There’s a Place and the final song of the day, Twist and Shout.¹
25 February 1963 (Mon) — mono + stereo mixing, EMI Studios, Studio One control room — Studio One control room only, 10.00am–1.00pm. P: George Martin. E: Norman Smith. 2E: A.B. Lincoln. Beatles NOT present. Mono mixing: Do You Want to Know a Secret (from take 8). Stereo mixing: Do You Want to Know a Secret (from take 8). Martin: “The reason I used the stereo machine in twin-track form was simply to make the mono better, to delay the vital decision of submerging the voices into the background. I certainly didn’t separate them for people to hear them separate!”¹

I think John and I were really concentrating on ‘We’ll do the real records!’ but because the other guys had a lot of fans we wrote for them too. … To some degree, ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret’ for George was that way too.— Paul McCartney¹

Studio Notes

Superimposition method on Twin-Track — The released master (take 8) was a superimposition take that added harmony vocal and two drum sticks being tapped together onto the existing take 6. This two-stage process — basic backing track, then SI overdub — was the standard method for all Twin-Track recordings where more than two simultaneous sound sources were needed. “[I]nitial takes of ‘Taste of Honey’, ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret’, ‘There’s A Place’, and ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ were recorded to Twin-Track only, as it was known that more material would be added later via tape-to-tape superimposition, there was no need to make a Delta-Mono mix yet.” The Delta-Mono parallel-reduction process was discontinued after the 5 March 1963 session.^1,2
REDD.37 console in Studio Two — correcting the v1 “REDD.37 / REDD.51” boilerplate — The 1963 equipment summary lists the REDD.37 as the console in Studio Two. The REDD.51 was the Studio Three console, not Studio Two. The v1 page’s dual listing was generic era boilerplate; since the 11 February session was exclusively in Studio Two (recording) and the Studio One control room (mixing), only the REDD.37 applies to this page.²
BTR3 Twin-Track tape machine — correcting the v1 “BTR-2” — The 1963 equipment summary lists the BTR3 as the Twin-Track tape machine used for recording sessions until 17 October 1963, when the Studer J37 four-track became the primary machine. The v1 page’s “BTR-2” was an incorrect machine designation. For mixdown: BTR2 (mono), BTR3 (stereo).²
Vocal chain and drum miking — Norman Smith’s 1963 vocal chain used the Neumann U48 microphone. Overhead drums were captured with the STC 4038, bass drum with the STC 4033-A. The compressor/limiter rack for 1963 sessions comprised the RS124, RS114 and RS127.²
Hard L/R panning inherent to the REDD.37 — “When monitoring in stereo, Track 1 of the Twin-Track tape was automatically panned hard Left by default, and Track 2 was panned hard Right.” This fixed-panning limitation of the REDD.37 console explains the extreme channel separation on the early stereo mixes, including Do You Want to Know a Secret. The effect was a byproduct of the console’s routing architecture, not a deliberate creative choice — the mono mix, summing both tracks to centre, was always the intended master.²
George Martin’s stereo-as-mono-production-tool philosophy — Martin’s statement during the 25 February mixing session — “The reason I used the stereo machine in twin-track form was simply to make the mono better, to delay the vital decision of submerging the voices into the background. I certainly didn’t separate them for people to hear them separate!” — is the canonical declaration of the principle that governed all EMI stereo mixing through the mid-1960s: the stereo machine existed to service mono production, not as a distribution format. The mono Please Please Me (PMC 1202) was the definitive release; the stereo pressing (PCS 3042) was a secondary product made from the same session with no additional creative input.¹

Releases

1963 UK mono LP Please Please Me (22 March 1963, Parlophone PMC 1202, side B track 4) — Released mono master mixed from take 8 on 25 February 1963 at the Studio One control room. P: George Martin. E: Norman Smith. 2E: A.B. Lincoln. Beatles not present for the mix. The mono master sums both tracks of the Twin-Track tape to centre; this was the intended distribution format.¹
1963 UK stereo LP Please Please Me (22 March 1963, Parlophone PCS 3042, side B track 4) — Stereo master from the same 25 February mixing session. The REDD.37’s fixed hard-L/R panning places Track 1 hard left and Track 2 hard right, producing the extreme channel separation characteristic of all early-1963 stereo mixes. Martin: “I certainly didn’t separate them for people to hear them separate!”^1,2
1963 UK EP Twist and Shout (12 July 1963, Parlophone GEP 8882, B side) — Same 1963 mono master. B side paired with There’s a Place.¹
1964 US single (23 March 1964, Vee-Jay VJ 587) — Do You Want to Know a Secret / Thank You Girl. First US single release, pressed from the UK mono master tape. Reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. The Vee-Jay release preceded the song’s Capitol-era US availability.¹
2009 Stereo Remasters — Please Please Me (Stereo Box) (9 September 2009, Apple/EMI) — Allan Rouse / Guy Massey / Steve Rooke 24-bit flat transfer of the 1963 stereo master, with the original hard-L/R panning preserved unchanged.
2009 Mono Masters — Please Please Me (The Beatles in Mono) (9 September 2009, Apple/EMI) — Flat transfer of the 1963 mono master. The mono box set is the closest commercially available representation of the original PMC 1202 pressing.

Sources

Mark Lewisohn, The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions (New York: Harmony Books, 1988), 12, 24, 28, 200.
Kevin Ryan and Brian Kehew, Recording the Beatles: The Studio Equipment and Techniques Used to Create Their Classic Albums (Houston: Curvebender Publishing, 2006), 362, 365, 368–69.

Frequently asked

Who wrote Do You Want to Know a Secret?

“Do You Want to Know a Secret” was written by John Lennon (Lennon–McCartney).

Who sings lead on Do You Want to Know a Secret?

The lead vocal on “Do You Want to Know a Secret” is by George Harrison.

When was Do You Want to Know a Secret recorded?

“Do You Want to Know a Secret” was recorded 11 February 1963 at EMI Studios, Abbey Road (Studio Two), and mixed 25 February 1963 in the Studio One control room.¹

How many takes did Do You Want to Know a Secret require?

Eight — takes 1–8 were recorded on 11 February 1963, with take eight (a superimposition of harmony vocal and drum-stick percussion onto take six) selected as the master.¹

On this page

Story

What's distinctive

Recording

Equipment

Recording Timeline

Studio Notes

Releases

Sources

Frequently asked