1969. With no strings or other added instrumentation, it was closer to the Beatles' original intention than the 1970 version. This take is also the one seen in the film Let It Be and on the Beatles' 2015 video compilation 1. Starr said of the Let It Be... Naked version: "There's nothing wrong with Phil's strings [on the 1970 release], this is just a different attitude to listening. But it's been 30-odd years since I've heard it without all that and it just blew me away." "The Long and Winding Road" has continued to be a staple of McCartney's post-Beatles concert repertoire. In July 2005, he performed the song to close the Live 8 concert in London. On his 2009 tours, McCartney played it as part of a nostalgia-filled set that included tributes to Linda, Lennon and Harrison. In the case of "The Long and Winding Road", the performance was accompanied by screen-projected photos taken by Linda of the family's Arizona ranch, including the horse trail she and McCartney rode shortly before her death. Cover versions "The Long and Winding Road" was one of several McCartney compositions from the Beatles era that became widely covered by easy listening artists and persuaded adults that the younger generation's musical tastes had merit. A version by British singer Ray Morgan reached number 32 on the UK Singles Chart in 1970. As McCartney had originally envisaged, Ray Charles recorded a cover version in 1971, released on Volcanic Action of My Soul. A "live" vocal of Ray, as described in the liner notes to "Ray Sings, Basie Swings", was later overdubbed with the Count Basie Orchestra and issued on that 2006 album. Aretha Franklin released a recording of the song on her 1972 album Young, Gifted and Black, a version that Rolling Stone writer Rob Sheffield calls "the greatest of all Beatle covers". Cilla Black released a version on her 1973 Martin-produced album Day by Day with Cilla; McCartney described this recording as the definitive version of the song. Other versions include a cover by Leo Sayer on the 1976 All This and World War II soundtrack, a 1978 recording by Peter Frampton for Robert Stigwood's film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, a 1999 performance by George Michael at the Royal Albert Hall memorial concert for Linda McCartney, and a 2010 performance at the White House by Faith Hill when Barack Obama gave McCartney