section_path: Artistry/Genres
section_name: Genres
paragraph_text: Genres
  
  Originating as a skiffle group, the Beatles quickly embraced 1950s rock and roll and helped pioneer the Merseybeat genre, and their repertoire ultimately expanded to include a broad variety of pop music. Reflecting the range of styles they explored, Lennon said of Beatles for Sale, "You could call our new one a Beatles country-and-western LP", while Gould credits Rubber Soul as "the instrument by which legions of folk-music enthusiasts were coaxed into the camp of pop".
  
  Although the 1965 song "Yesterday" was not the first pop record to employ orchestral strings, it marked the group's first recorded use of classical music elements. Gould observes, "The more traditional sound of strings allowed for a fresh appreciation of their talent as composers by listeners who were otherwise allergic to the din of drums and electric guitars." They continued to experiment with string arrangements to various effect; Sgt. Pepper ' s " She's Leaving Home ", for instance, is "cast in the mold of a sentimental Victorian ballad", Gould writes, "its words and music filled with the clichés of musical melodrama".
  
  The band's stylistic range expanded in another direction with their 1966 B-side "Rain", described by Martin Strong as "the first overtly psychedelic Beatles record". Other psychedelic numbers followed, such as "Tomorrow Never Knows" (recorded before "Rain"), "Strawberry Fields Forever", " Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds ", and " I Am the Walrus ". The influence of Indian classical music was evident in Harrison's " The Inner Light ", " Love You To ", and " Within You Without You " – Gould describes the latter two as attempts "to replicate the raga form in miniature".
  
  Innovation was the most striking feature of their creative evolution, according to music historian and pianist Michael Campbell: " ' A Day in the Life' encapsulates the art and achievement of the Beatles as well as any single track can. It highlights key features of their music: the sound imagination, the persistence of tuneful melody, and the close coordination between words and music. It represents a new category of song – more sophisticated than pop... and uniquely innovative. There literally had never before been a song – classical or vernacular – that had blended so many disparate elements so imaginatively." Philosophy professor Bruce Ellis Benson agrees: "The Beatles... give us a wonderful example of how such far-ranging influences as Celtic music, rhythm and blues, and country and western could be put together in a new way."
  
  Author Dominic Pedler describes the way they crossed musical styles: "Far from moving sequentially from one genre to another (as is sometimes conveniently suggested) the group maintained in parallel their mastery of the traditional, catchy chart hit while simultaneously forging rock and dabbling with a wide range of peripheral influences from country to vaudeville. One of these threads was their take on folk music, which would form such essential groundwork for their later collisions with Indian music and philosophy." As the personal relationships between the band members grew increasingly strained, their individual tastes became more apparent. The minimalistic cover artwork for the White Album contrasted with the complexity and diversity of its music, which encompassed Lennon's " Revolution 9 " (whose musique concrète approach was influenced by Yoko Ono), Starr's country song " Don't Pass Me By ", Harrison's rock ballad " While My Guitar Gently Weeps ", and the " proto-metal roar" of McCartney's " Helter Skelter ".