Black Beauty, composed by Thijs van Leer. Recorded in 1970 by Focus on their debut album "In and Out of Focus"
Thijs van Leer had previously used the melody on his 1968 solo release "Jij, Witte Nimf"
Played here on a Gibson Les Paul Studio 70s tribute guitar and Yamaha PSS F30 keyboard, with a backing track programmed with "Chordpulse".
I haven't attempted to do a straight copy of the Focus recording, (mainly down to ability!) On the "In and Out of Focus" version there was a vocal by the band's original drummer Hans Cleuver who wrote the lyric for that recording. Focus re-visited the tune as an instrumental on their album "Focus 9/New Skin" released in 2010.
This is my take on what I think is a wonderful catchy melody that I first heard in the early 70s and have loved ever since.
The Gibson guitar is plugged into a Sonicake Matribox effects processor and recorded direct to PC via a USB.