Free as a Bird

"Free as a Bird" is a song performed by The Beatles. The single was released on 4 December 1995, as part of the promotion for the release of The Beatles Anthology video documentary and the band's Anthology 1 compilation album. The song had been written and recorded as a demo by John Lennon in 1977. Paul McCartney asked Lennon's widow Yoko Ono for any unreleased material by Lennon, and "Free as a Bird" was chosen as being the song all three remaining Beatles could be involved in, as they could finish the arrangement and write extra lyrics. Jeff Lynne of Electric Light Orchestra was asked to co-produce the record as he had worked with George Harrison as part of The Traveling Wilburys. The music video for "Free as a Bird" was produced by Vincent Joliet and directed by Joe Pytka (Space Jam) and depicts, from the point of view of a bird in flight, many references to The Beatles songs, such as "Strawberry Fields Forever," "Penny Lane", "Paperback Writer", "A Day in the Life", "Eleanor Rigby", "Helter Skelter" and many, many more.