The Beatles Michelle lyrics
This site covers the original British Beatles Albums plus analyses of the lyrics of non-album tracks.
Information on how the Beatles wrote the lyrics to the Rubber Soul album songs can be navigated from below.
Find out how the lyrics to the Beatles song Michelle came to be written.
The Beatles song Michelle is inspired by Paul McCartney’s arty days when he was growing up in Liverpool with John Lennon and Stuart Sutcliffe, where Paul used to do a comical imitation of a bohemian influenced guy who was playing a French sounding song on the guitar at a party.
John Lennon convinced Paul to write proper lyrics for the song so that it could be included on the rubber soul album. Paul was playing about with the idea of using the lyrics ‘hello my Dear’ but decided to go for a French feel. He got advised from Jan Vaughan, a French teacher and he asked her for French ‘words that go together well’. He even asked Jan fo a two sylabelle French girls name and a rhyming description, she then came up with the lyric Michelle ma belle. A few days later he got her to translate the words go together well into French, and she answered ‘sont les mots qui vont tres bien enseble’.
Upon hearing it John Lennon suggested the addition of I love you, I love you in the middle of the Beatles Michelle song, at the time John was very much into the music of Nina Simone.