That'll Be the Day
For the 1973 film starring David Essex see That'll Be The Day.
"
That'll Be The Day" by
Buddy Holly and
The Crickets is credited as being written by
Jerry Allison the drummer with the group; Holly (the lead guitarist and vocalist); and
Norman Petty the record's producer. It is generally accepted that although Petty is given a credit for the composition, he was never actually involved in the writing, but only in the production of this well-known recording.
The song had its genesis in a trip to the movies by Holly, Allison and
Sonny Curtis in June of 1956. The
John Wayne film
The Searchers was playing, a movie regarded by many film critics as one of The Duke's best. It certainly impressed the young men, especially Wayne's frequently-used, world-weary
catchphrase, "That'll be the day!"
Soon after, Holly along with Allison wrote a song centered on that phrase. They recorded it initially on July 22, 1956, at the
Decca studio in
Nashville, Tennessee. The Decca studio had produced some good Holly efforts, but their recording of "That'll Be the Day" was of poor quality, due to the producer's insistence that Holly sing it at the upper limit of his range while playing it slowly, seemingly dragging it out. This original can be heard in the vinyl collection produced in the 1980s, "The Complete Buddy Holly".
The definitive version, which eventually became a Number 1 seller on the
Billboard Hot 100, was recorded eight months later, at the Norman Petty studios in
Clovis, New Mexico, on February 25, 1957. Petty was an excellent producer who helped the Crickets create some of their best work, but these superior results came with a price, as Petty insisted on co-authorship credit, and attendant royalty dollars.
Featured on the track are:
* Buddy Holly - Lead guitar and vocals
* Larry Welborn - Bass
* Jerry Allison - Drums
* Niki Sullivan - Background vocals
* June Clark - Background vocals
* Gary Tollett - Background vocals
* Ramona Tollett - Background vocals
This song is connected with
Don McLean's song "
American Pie", which talks about the history of
rock and roll music. In that song, McLean talks about
the day the music died referring to
February 3,
1959, when three popular rock'n roll singers of the time died together in a plane crash: Buddy Holly,
Ritchie Valens and
J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson. McLean took the phrase "This'll be the day that I die" from the line in
this song, "That'll be the day-ay-ay when I die".
In 1958 the song was recorded at the Kensington Custom Service in Liverpool by the Quarrymen, who were to become
The Beatles, on their first ever recording. Their rendition would be issued officially on the first Anthology in 1995.
That'll Be The Day was also the name of a film made in 1973 which starred
David Essex and
Ringo Starr and used a lot of recorded music on the soundtrack. They were unable to obtain the rights to use original Holly recordings and had to make do with
Bobby Vee's covers.
Many others have covered this song, including
Linda Ronstadt in 1976, during a time when she was releasing a number of hits from covers of old songs.
Buddy Holly: A Biography, by Ellis Amburn, St. Martin's, 1995.
