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No.186 / When I’m Sixty-Four
This cheerful pop number appears on the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967).
Let me start by talking about the lyrics.
The theme—“Will you still love me when I’m sixty-four?”—is reminiscent of Chisato Moritaka’s Watashi ga Obasan ni Natte mo (1992), yet this one is sung entirely from a man’s point of view.
At the start, he gently asks, “Even when I get old and my hair starts to thin, will you still care?”
In the second verse, he tries to sell himself: “I can replace fuses, I’ll take care of the garden—I’m actually quite useful.”
Then he wraps it up with the line, “Here you are, with three grandchildren sitting on your knee.”
From a musical perspective, it’s a song that fully showcases Paul McCartney’s personality—similar to pieces like “Your Mother Should Know” (Magical Mystery Tour) and “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” (Abbey Road).
This March, I reached the very age mentioned in the song.
In late February, when spring was almost in sight, I was drinking with fellow musicians when someone egged me on, saying, “If you’re ever going to sing it, this is the year!”
I couldn’t stop myself, so I’ve been singing it every chance I get—and now it’s already December.
Part of me feels that being 64 today still makes you a mere youngster. Yet at the same time, I’ve been making more mistakes at work, and it’s been a year in which I clearly felt that something has changed.
There’s no retirement age for creative expression, and there are still moments when I feel myself growing.
I first heard this song when I was about 12 or 13. The fact that I’m now 64 and actually performing it feels both strange and amusing.
For me, music is less a subject to study or analyze and more something that exists in everyday life—something that brightens people and the world around us.
Music has the power to make that happen, but practicing and continuing it is incredibly difficult and profoundly meaningful.
As I turn 64, and December comes around again, I find myself reflecting on that very deeply.
＝ December 10, 2025 / MoTet ＝
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