McCartney did not finish the song in time for the double album, but he played it in early January 1969 at the Twickenham Film Studios sessions for the Get Back project. Lennon never understood why Paul brought this song into rehearsals that were intended to culminate in a live rock and roll performance. Nevertheless, the group spent a great deal of time working on their arrangement of the number. Once the sessions moved to Apple Studios in Savile Row and Billy Preston joined the lineup, his churchlike organ part added a true gospel flair to the number.
Of course, the song was not suitable for the famous rooftop performance on January 30th. Along with two other McCartney compositions, Two of Us and The Long and Winding Road, it was played on the following day down in the basement studio. The Beatles and Billy Preston were set up with Paul in the center sitting at a piano for the benefit of the documentary film crew as the group ran through the number several times before getting the best performance.
The entire project was put on the back burner for a few months before engineer Glyn Johns was assigned the task of compiling a Get Back album. The guiding principle of the Get Back project was that every track would be live with no overdubs, but on April 30th, 1969, an exception would be made. George's guitar solo on Let it Be was considered to be not good enough, so he overdubbed a new one, both lovely and melodic, onto the selected performance from January 31st. Yet another producer, Chris Thomas, was in the control room for this session. Glyn Johns used this version for his Get Back album, which wound up being rejected by the Beatles.
The album Abbey Road consumed the group's energies for much of the rest of the year, but by late 1969, the documentary was nearing completion, and an accompanying soundtrack album would be needed in time for the film's release. On January 4th, 1970, multiple overdubs were added to Let it Be including a second stinging guitar solo. Ringo added some tom toms during the final verse, and George, Paul and Linda McCartney provided some new backing vocals. Plus producer George Martin conducted a small brass arrangement, and even added a few cellos (which for the life of me I cannot hear) near the end of the song.
The very next day, Glyn Johns decided to ignore all of these new overdubs and stuck with the April 30th guitar solo for his second attempt at assembling a Get Back album. However, this, too, was rejected by the group.
Yet the song's importance only grew as it was chosen to be the A-side of the group's 22nd (and, in the UK, their final) single. George Martin oversaw this release (his final task for the Beatles during their career, as well), and he used all of the new overdubs from January 4th, except for the new guitar solo. He, too, preferred the mellower April 30th version. This single was released in early March, 1970.
Only a few weeks later, everything changed. The title of the film was now Let it Be, thus making the song the centerpiece of the required soundtrack album, and, most importantly, Phil Spector was brought in to produce that album. On March 26th, Spector reinserted the stinging guitar solo from January 4th, punched up George Martin's brass overdub and Ringo's tom toms, added reverb to Ringo's hi-hats, and repeated the chorus one more time at the end via use of an edit.
The song has appeared many times over the years, usually represented by George Martin's single version. This is the case on the Blue Album, Reel Music, the US version of 20 Greatest Hits, Past Masters Volume Two, and 1. Anthology 3 has a take from January 25th, 1969 without Billy Preston, and Let it Be...Naked inserts a guitar solo from a different take into the January 31st, 1969 master.
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