{"id":8249,"date":"2020-05-28T16:31:42","date_gmt":"2020-05-28T21:31:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thefest.com\/kdstaging2\/?p=8249"},"modified":"2020-05-28T16:32:14","modified_gmt":"2020-05-28T21:32:14","slug":"the-beatles-may-be-im-amazed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/the-beatles-may-be-im-amazed\/","title":{"rendered":"The Beatles: MAY-be I’m Amazed!"},"content":{"rendered":"

::: By Jude Southerland Kessler :::<\/strong><\/p>\r\n

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The FEST for Beatles Fans<\/em><\/strong> has been tracing the \u201cdoings\u201d of The Beatles, month-by-month, throughout their years together to see if we can glean a bit o\u2019 wisdom from what \u201cthe lads\u201d did in the seasons of their lives. From January\u2019s events, we learned the value of industry and hard work. From April, we learned that suffering isn\u2019t forever and will surely be followed by happier days!<\/em><\/p>\r\n

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What can we glean from the experiences that John, Paul, George, and Ringo shared in their Mays together? Well, let\u2019s find out with John Lennon biographer, Jude Southerland Kessler\u2026<\/em><\/p>\r\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\r\n

May 1961 – <\/strong>The Beatles, in Hamburg for a second rollicking time, have been given the opportunity to actually cut a record \u2014 as a back-up band for headliner, Tony Sheridan. Though they were contracted to play at the Top Ten Club, the boys had been sneaking over to the Star Club, according to Tony Sheridan, and singing with the star on stage, and the Liverpool lads were quite popular there! As it happened, Sheridan \u2014 who had just been signed by music mogul, Bert Kaempfert, to a contract with Polydor Records \u2014 was looking for a back-up band to assist him with his first release. Naturally, he selected the popular Beatles and directed them to meet him \u201cin studio.\u201d Paul recalls, \u201cWe\u2026expected a recording setup on a grand scale…Instead, we found ourselves in an unexciting school gym with a massive stage and lots of drapes.\u201d But despite The Beatles\u2019 clear disappointment, the boys (as The Beat Brothers) gave their back-up rendition of \u201cMy Bonnie\u201d and \u201cWhen the Saints Go Marching In\u201d their all<\/em>! And it\u2019s THIS record \u2014 requested months later of Liverpool NEMS owner Brian Epstein \u2014 that induced Epstein to visit the Cavern Club on 9 November 1961 and \u201cmeet The Beatles.\u201d That Hamburg school gym recording studio may not have been what the boys anticipated, but the results \u2014 which are still being felt today \u2014 were quite unanticipated <\/em>as well! The modest recording studio led The Beatles down \u201ca long and winding road\u201d of lasting fame.<\/p>\r\n

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May 1964<\/strong> – After completing their first film for United Artists, \u201cA Hard Day\u2019s Night,\u201d The Beatles set out on some much-needed breaks. George and John, who\u2019d decided to holiday together, traveled happily with John\u2019s wife, Cynthia, and George\u2019s girl, Pattie Boyd. Now, the concept of a yacht moored just off Papeete, Tahiti sounded<\/em> divine after two long months of early mornings on set, 8-hour days filming, nights in EMI\u2019s Studio Two recording a soundtrack LP, and many additional interviews and television shows sandwiched into the boys\u2019 spare time as well. But once on board the rather ramshackle boat \u2014 with a sparse menu featuring primarily potatoes and a library with only one book (The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes<\/em>) \u2014 John became fiercely bored. He discovered that he was much happier<\/em> filling his days with creative work. So, he began writing songs (such as \u201cAny Time at All,\u201d for Cynthia) and penning pieces (\u201cSnore Wife and the Seven D\u2026\u201d) for his second book, eventually entitled A Spaniard in the Works<\/em>. George complained that John \u2014 who\u2019d been going on for weeks and weeks about \u201cneedin\u2019 peace\u201d \u2014 now only wanted to work. It was what Lennon truly longed for \u2014 John found out.<\/p>\r\n

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May 1967<\/strong> – After working for weeks on their most unusual and controversial LP to date, in May of 1967, The Beatles were releasing Sgt. Pepper\u2019s Lonely Hearts Club Band<\/em> to a waiting world. And to celebrate what he thought would be the LP that encouraged his boys to brush shoulders with the public once again (perhaps even tour!<\/em>), Brian Epstein celebrated via a lavish party in his Belgravia flat. Inviting in the \u201cWho\u2019s Who\u201d of London, Brian expected John, Paul, George, and Ringo to serve as co-hosts \u2014 meeting and greeting the posh public. However, the boys arrived \u201crather out of it.\u201d In fact, John \u2014 in a faux fur-lined, orange, print jacket \u2014 was deliriously giddy. Even Paul, who was customarily the group\u2019s spokesperson, was rather agog that evening when an enchanting, blonde, American photographer he\u2019d met four days earlier, Linda Eastman, knelt down in front of him to capture his picture. Deeply engaged in conversation, the two seemed quite taken with one another, and Brian was left to entertain his guests on his own.<\/p>\r\n

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May 1968<\/strong> – Inviting his three friends to his Esher bungalow late in May, 1968, George Harrison anticipated a fun and relaxing afternoon. Sitting together on low, backless sofas, or wide, decorative cushions, The Beatles shared with one another the songs they\u2019d been writing throughout the spring \u2014 both during their time in Rishikesh, India, and then back home in England. John demonstrated unpolished germs of remarkable songs. Paul offered up a tape of more perfected work. And George, wanting to remember the special afternoon, decided to record it all\u2026just for fun. How surprised George would\u2019ve been to see the impact of 2018\u2019s remastered Esher Demos<\/em>, his tape of that afternoon \u2014 the priceless seminal rendition of what would morph into the White Album.<\/em> A lazy day shared by four friends in the British countryside was transformed: a priceless peek into The Beatles\u2019 private lives and their methods of creating and recording music. What set out to be a jam session, more or less, ended up becoming a classic work of musical genius.<\/p>\r\n

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The Beatles\u2019 Mays together seem to say one very Forrest Gump-ish thing, \u201cYou never know what you\u2019re going to get.\u201d Expecting Bert Kaempfert to afford them a lavish recording studio, the boys got a school gym recording space. Expecting that rather amateurish recording (so it seemed) to fall by the wayside, \u201cMy Bonnie\u201d spawned sixty years of unequaled fame. Expecting a holiday on a yacht to calm his spirit, John Lennon discovered he craved work, and expecting an afternoon jam session to be just a bit of \u201cin house\u201d amusement, The Beatles inadvertently, \u201ccut a record.\u201d The boys\u2019 days together in the \u201cmerry month of May\u201d always afforded a wealth of surprises. Time and again, they were amazed\u2026well, MAYbe.<\/em><\/p>\r\n

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Jude Southerland Kessler is the author of the John Lennon Series: www.johnlennonseries.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\r\n

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Jude is represented by 910 Public Relations — @910PubRel<\/a> on Twitter and 910 Public Relations<\/a> on Facebook.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

::: By Jude Southerland Kessler :::   The FEST for Beatles Fans has been tracing the \u201cdoings\u201d of The Beatles, month-by-month, throughout their years together to see if we can glean a bit o\u2019 wisdom from what \u201cthe lads\u201d did […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":8250,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[117],"class_list":["post-8249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-baby-boomer-beatles-blog","tag-the-beatles"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8249"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8249\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8252,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8249\/revisions\/8252"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}