George Harrison Skipped a Business Meeting and Walked Into a Friend’s Garden. He Came Back With “Here Comes the Sun”

By the spring of 1969, being a Beatle had started to feel a lot like going to the office.

The band’s company, Apple, was tangled in business and legal problems. George Harrison later described it as being like school, with everyone expected to act like businessmen and sign one paper after another.

England had also come through a long, gray winter.

So one day, George decided to skip it. Instead of heading to another meeting with accountants, he went over to the home of his friend Eric Clapton in Surrey.

He borrowed one of Eric’s acoustic guitars and walked around the garden. The relief of being away from it all, he said, was wonderful.

Somewhere on that walk, “Here Comes the Sun” began.

The Beatles recorded it that July. John Lennon was recovering from a car accident when the first sessions took place, so George, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr laid down the track. George later added a Moog synthesizer, then a brand-new invention and a rarity in Britain.

The song opened side two of “Abbey Road,” released in the fall of 1969.

Decades later, it found new listeners in every generation, and in 2023 it became the first Beatles song to pass one billion plays on Spotify.

The official video, made for the album’s 50th anniversary, ends with George himself standing in a field of wildflowers.

It is a fitting picture. One of the most hopeful songs ever written came from a man who simply needed a sunny morning off.