"The Great Gig in the Sky" is the fifth track on The Dark Side of the Moon, a 1973 album by English rock band Pink Floyd. The song features music by keyboard player Richard Wright and improvised, wordless vocals by session singer Clare Torry. It is one of only three Pink Floyd songs to feature lead vocals from an outside artist.
"The Great Gig in the Sky" was released as a digital single on February 10, 2023, to promote The Dark Side of the Moon 50th Anniversary box set.
Writing
The song began as a chord progression created by keyboard player Richard Wright, which was known in its early stages as "The Mortality Sequence" or "The Religion Song". During the first half of 1972, it was performed live as a simple organ instrumental, accompanied by spoken-word extracts from the Bible and snippets of speeches by Malcolm Muggeridge, a British writer known for his conservative religious views.
By September 1972, the lead instrument had been switched to a piano, with an arrangement very similar to the final form but without vocals, and with a slightly different chord sequence in the middle. Various sound effects were tried over the track, including recordings of NASA astronauts communicating on space missions, but none were satisfactory.
On Classic Albums: Pink Floyd – The Making of The Dark Side of the Moon, it is stated that during the recording of the album, in which death and life had been a consistent theme, the members of the band went around asking questions and recording responses from people working inside Abbey Road at the time. Among the questions, they were asked "Are you afraid of dying?" The responses of doorman Gerry O'Driscoll and the wife of their road manager Peter Watts were used, as well as other spoken parts throughout the album ("I've always been mad", "That geezer was cruisin' for a bruisin").
(At 0:39)
(At 3:33, faintly)