helen shapiro tour 1963

• Beatles Tours

The Helen Shapiro Tour

by admin · Published July 14, 2008 · Updated January 18, 2023

February 5, 1963. Backstage at the Gaumont Cinema, Doncaster, the second stop on the Helen Shapiro tour.

This is the story of The Beatles/Helen Shapiro tour of 1963. It used to be in eight parts when we first published it in 2008, but here is the full article assembled from these bits and pieces. 1963 was when they “hit it big” in Britain, and started getting hits also in other European countries. This is the beginning. Their second single “Please Please Me” was released on January 11, and went to number one on the British charts on February 22nd. They had begun a nationwide tour with Helen Shapiro on February 2nd at the bottom of the bill.

Advertisement for the opening night in Bradford

Helen Shapiro was only 14 when she recorded the hit single, “Walkin’ Back To Happiness” in 1961. It went to number 1 on the singles charts in the UK, Ireland, New Zealand, Israel and South Africa. In the early 1960s Helen Shapiro was England’s top selling female artist, and this was her biggest selling single. Shapiro never wanted to record this song, as she felt it sounded too corny and old-fashioned to appeal to her fans. Shapiro says in 1000 UK #1 Hits by Jon Kutner and Spencer Leigh, “I was brought up on blues and jazz and I thought Walkin’ Back To Happiness was corny – all that ‘woop-bah-oh-yea-yeah.’ I still don’t like the song but everyone goes mad for it so I’ve been proved wrong. That kind of rhythm was not my scene and I didn’t really want to do it. I preferred the B-side, Kiss And Run, which was written by Norrie Paramour.”

Shapiro’s single also spent one week at #100​ in the Billboard top 100 US chart – Shapiro’s only chart entry there.

“Brian telephoned Arthur Howes about booking the group. The Beatles had ‘Love Me Do’ on the charts at the time but were relatively unknown. Howes, one of Britain’s leading concert promoters, offered the Beatles £30 a night for the Helen Shapiro tour and wouldn’t pay them at all for a performance with Frank Ifield beyond traveling expenses. Brian responded by giving Howes first option on all future Beatle tours.” (Lewisohn. Chronicle p. 62)

With their first prestigious British tour scheduled to start on February 2nd, The Beatles decided once more to improve the appearance of their stage equipment. Starr’s name had to be taken off the front of his drum-head. After all, the group were going to be seen by thousands of new potential fans during their first real tour. They didn’t want people walking away after the performance wondering what the band was called … or thinking it might be The Ringo Starr Band. It was time to design a Beatles logo for the front of the bass drum.

Development of the “bug logo” for the bass drum

Various drawings that McCartney made for a Beatles logo were published in his brother Mike’s 1981 book, The Macs. These interesting documents show the preliminary sketches that would eventually become the group’s “bug” logo. The ideas were taken to a local signwriter in Liverpool, Tex O’Hara, whose brother Brian was guitarist in another Epstein-managed band, The Fourmost.

Tex explains, “We played around with different ideas to find out. which ones they liked. I did about live to ten drawings – which I’ve still got – and showed them to the group. They settled on one logo, which was put on a piece of linen and stretched across the front of the drum.” This second bass-drum head on Starr’s Premier drum set was plain while, without the Premier brandname and with the new Beatle “bug” logo. This had a script-style “Beatles”, the “B” of which was decorated with two bug-like antennae. It was simply drawn on a piece of cloth that was stretched across the drum head, and held down with the bass-drum’s mounting hoops.

At “Thank your lucky stars” on TV, February 17 during the break in the Helen Shapiro tour. Original colours.

Tex recalled in 1983: “All I can remember is they were shown to the group in a flat in Ullet Road, Toxteth, and John added a small Beetle to the top of the letter B, and Paul put one on top of the letter L.”

McCartney played his Höfner bass, Harrison and Lennon both used their Gibson J-160E acoustic-electric guitars, and Starr played his Premier drum set with the new “bug” Beatles logo displayed on the front drum head.

The tour acts (from the printed programme)

THE BEATLES / HELEN SHAPIRO TOUR 1963

• 2 February Gaumont, Bradford
• 5 February Gaumont, Doncaster
• 6 February Granada, Bedford
• 7 February Regal, Kirkgate
• 8 February ABC, Carlisle
• 9 February Empire, Sunderland
• 23 February Granada, Mansfield
• 24 February Coventry Theatre, Coventry
• 26 February Gaumont, Taunton
• 27 February Rialto, York
• 28 February Granada, Shrewsbury
• 1 March Odeon, Southport
• 2 March City Hall, Sheffield
• 3 March Gaumont, Hanley

The Shapiro tour carried on after the break, and the group continued to use their familiar equipment. But Lennon was again having problems with his Rickenbacker. The Homer volume knobs that he had put on the guitar when it was painted black started to fall off: first one, then another. Lennon used the Rickenbacker with two knobs missing for a while before he once again replaced them all with a new set of Burns knobs.

Handbill for the Sheffield concerts

With the immediate radio success of the new song, coupled with their second appearance on the Thank Your Lucky Stars television program on February 17th, they quickly moved to second only to Shapiro on the tour bill. The Shapiro tour ended on March 3rd, the day after this Sheffield date, which was two days after John and Paul wrote “From Me To You” on the tour bus, the song quickly recorded as the Beatles’ third single on March 5th. The three famous package tours with the Beatles started with this Helen Shapiro tour, continued with the Chris Montez/Tommy Roe tour and ended with the Roy Orbison tour. After that, the Beatles were on their own and had their first tour of another country, Sweden.

Would Bill Berry have acted differently if he’d known who the four young men in leather jackets were, and what they would become?

Berry approached them, had a quiet word, and the four leather jackets slipped away into obscurity. Well, not quite. John, Paul, George and Ringo managed to bounce back from the snub they suffered in Cumberland in 1963. More than one billion records sold and a legacy as the greatest act in popular music are testament to that.

The night the Beatles were asked to leave the Crown and Mitre ballroom has long been a part of Fab Four and Carlisle legend. And the story has now been told for the first time by one of the stars who was there. Not one of the Beatles, but the singer who topped the bill on their first nationwide tour. Helen Shapiro was only 16 when she arrived in Carlisle with the Beatles on Friday February 8, 1963. Shapiro had already had two number one singles while Beatlemania was on the verge of exploding.

Recalling this tour years later, Ringo Starr said: “Helen was the star. She had the telly in her dressing room and we didn’t have one. We had to ask her if we could watch hers.” The soon-to-be-Fab Four’s second single, Please Please Me, was riding high when they played the ABC Cinema – later to become the Lonsdale – on Warwick Road.

The Beatles played two sets of four songs that night. Three of the songs – “Chains”, “A Taste Of Honey” and “Please Please Me” – were favourites from their Cavern set list and would soon appear on their debut album. The fourth was “Keep Your Hands Off My Baby”, a song they only ever recorded for the radio.

John and Helen in Southport, March 1 (newspaper clipping)

After the show the Beatles, Helen Shapiro and entertainer Kenny Lynch travelled a few hundred yards through Carlisle city centre to the Crown and Mitre. In the book – Legends On Tour: The Pop Package Tours Of The 1960s – Shapiro describes what happened next: “We were in the lobby area. Kenny and the Beatles were having a drink and I was having a cup of tea. This fellow was going into the banqueting suite when he saw us. He was really chuffed and asked us to go in. We weren’t interested. They were all dressed up and it wasn’t our kind of thing. We were just having a quiet drink, but he was really insistent. They had a buffet in there and that probably swung it. We never seemed to get much to eat on tour. We went to the buffet table and had something to eat. Ringo was particularly enjoying the food. Then we went on the dance floor – we may have still been eating.”

“I think I was twisting with Ringo. There were these ladies with their long gowns who made a beeline for the Beatles in their leather gear. Then suddenly this guy came over, a much older man, and he was huffing and puffing, getting red in the face. He ordered us to leave. ‘Who invited you?’ he asked. It was a shame really because nobody seemed to have a problem with us, apart from the one bloke.”

Helen was mortified when a national newspaper picked up the story. “The Daily Express headline was something like ‘Helen Shapiro Asked To Leave Golf Club Dance’. It referred to Helen Shapiro and ‘The instrumental group the Four Beatles’ being asked to leave. I was mortified. I thought that would be the end of me. I was only 16 and that sort of thing was not something to be proud of then. I never found out for certain who tipped off the press.”

Helen Shapiro with John and Ringo in Southport, March 1.

Dr George Jolly, who was a GP in Carlisle for many years and a long-time member of Carlisle Golf Club, was at the Crown and Mitre that night. Dr Jolly died in 2006 at the age of 91. Speaking to the News & Star several years ago, his memory of the evening was still clear: “The annual dance was a dinner-jacket affair in those days. I was the golf club’s vice-captain that year. The captain was a bluff Yorkshireman called Bill Berry. I was having a meal with Bill and his wife and my wife. Somebody had introduced four rather scruffy young men into the dance. They were leather-jacketed and all the rest. We saw them across the room and Bill said to me ‘I think we should ask them to leave. What do you think?’ I said ‘Yes, I think maybe we should.’ I didn’t recognise them and neither did Bill. They were just coming into their fame. Bill went across to have a word with them. They left without any ill-feeling. I suppose it is something to say you were involved in asking The Beatles to leave.”

Music promoter Andy Park saw the Beatles at the ABC that night, although he heard very little because of the fans’ screaming. He did hear about the Crown and Mitre incident though, soon after it happened. “I was in the 101 Club on Botchergate a couple of hours afterwards and people were talking about it. At the time I had no idea that The Beatles were going to be so big or last so long. Nobody knew. We thought pop music was only going to last six months. You had to be there at shows like this or you’d miss it.”

Helen Shapiro met the Beatles again on the TV Show “Ready Steady Go”.

Two days after leaving the Crown and Mitre the Beatles were at EMI’s Abbey Road studios in London where they recorded the bulk of their first album, “Please Please Me”, in just 10 hours. This album propelled them to the stardom which has never waned.

It seems the Beatles did not hold a grudge over their treatment in Carlisle. Nine months later they played the ABC again – and stayed at the Crown and Mitre again. In 2001, Paul McCartney proposed to Heather Mills at Ullswater’s Sharrow Bay Hotel. And the following year McCartney revealed that he likes to shop in Carlisle – because he is rarely recognised in the city.

February 7. at the Regal in Kirkgate (Colourised)

Support act The Honeys was a British group, consisting of three sisters in close harmony. Their true surname was Liddell and they began ca. 1952 as the Liddell Triplets. By 1963 two had married so their names were Pearl Liddell, Anita Lockhart and Vilma Harvey.

After the break in the tour, The Beatles got second billing on the tour’s advertisements.

They also got a full page in the concert programme.

This is the Beatles’ page from the official programme of the Helen Shapiro Tour. It reads:

THE BEATLES

The Beatles hit recorders of “Love Me Do” are no newcomers to show business, the group was formed way back in 1956 when the grind and scratch of skiffle was just starting to graze the pop horizon. So their breakthrough on records is backed by six years of maturing musical notions and practical experience which has taken them from Liverpool ballrooms to Hamburg night clubs, from church hall hops to colourful strip club stints in Liverpool’s China town.

Now the boys have outgrown their rock and skiffle phases to explode onto the highly competitive musical scene as a thoroughly groomed super-charged quartet.

They have played package shows alongside such top line artistes as Bruce Channel, Little Richard, Joe Brown (who thought they were fabulous) , Mike Berry, Gene Vincent, Mr. Acker Bilk and Kenny Ball on their respective tours.

Their latest recording “Please Please Me” looks destined for parade honours.

In an earlier version of the programme, they didn’t have that much space and were sandwiched between some of the other acts on the tour.

Earlier version of the programme

The front page of the programme

A story from the final night of the tour, the concerts were held at the Gaumont Cinema, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent

My fish and chip supper with The Beatles

John, dancing with Helen on the Ready Steady Go TV Show

This story was published 19 February 2000 at Regional press news – now gone to internet heaven, but preserved here.

Derek Adams, a former journalist on The Sentinel, Stoke, and the Derby Evening Telegraph, recalls the night in 1963 when he shared a fish and chip supper with the Fab Four ….and the prediction he made about their futures.

“Were you part of Beatlemania in the Swinging Sixties?”

– Part of them! I actually shared a fish and chips supper with the four lads in 1963 and recall John Lennon making chip sandwiches, Paul McCartney pouring tomato sauce over everything he ate, George Harrison drinking his hot tea direct from a saucer and Ringo Starr mistakenly shaking sugar on his chips instead of salt.

The Fab Four had earlier appeared for a one night two-house gig at the Gaumont Cinema, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, and as a junior reporter with the Stoke-on-Trent Evening Sentinel (a sister paper of the Derby Evening Telegraph for whom I later worked) I was sent along to review the whole programme for the paper’s Out and About section. Helen Shapiro was billed as the star of the show. The Beatles were the third act down on the official programme.

– I had certainly heard of Helen Shapiro. The name The Beatles was somewhat vague to me.I watched both ‘houses’ from the wings adjoining the stage at the Gaumont and recall The Beatles larking around and pushing each other before they actually appeared before the screaming hordes that had solidly packed the venue. When they finished their act they were all bathed in perspiration and both John and Paul dunked their heads beneath the dressing room’s cold water tap.

– We chatted in the dressing room for about three-quarters-of-an-hour, which included the official interval, while girls screamed at the dressing room window from the outside pavement below us. Ringo actually chucked a glass of water through the open dressing room window to the delight of the screamers.

– Following the second ‘house’ I was just about to leave the Gaumont at 11.30pm when John Lennon said to me: “Hey Wack, where can we get some fish and chips at this time of night and without the fans leering and screaming at us?” I knew of a fish and chip shop in an area known as Etruria, near Hanley, where you could sit at tables in the back of the shop. It also served bread and butter and tea. It was arranged that The Beatles follow my car in their Transit van and that we all dine together. I too had not eaten throughout that eventful evening. The meal lasted about an hour amid much laughter and joking and the occasional chip being rescued from someone’s cup of tea.

– The overnight digs for The Beatles was with a theatrical landlady who lived at 6 Adventure Place, Hanley. When the bill arrived for the meal there was much arguing among The Beatles on who would foot the bill. John said he had paid for a meal for all of them the night before and Paul and George said something similar about other evenings. Ringo eventually coughed up.

– We eventually said our good nights and off trundled The Beatles in their van. I returned to my lonely bed-sitter in an area known as Basford.

– Oh yes, that review …

– My piece that appeared in the Out and About section of the Evening Sentinel read along these lines: “A pleasant boy band typical of many others of this time but who could just make the very competitive pop scene if only they could make another hit record”.

‘Tis true, I tell you!

Helen Shapiro in the EMI Studio in Abbey Road, recording her hit single, “Walkin’ Back To Happiness”:

Tags: Shapiro

3 Responses

• Pingbacks 0

Hey that’s right, I saw the Beatles at the Regal in Wakefield, but the number of times in Books and on the net you see it as ABC or even Odeon is unbelivable !!

I was introduced to Helen via reading about this tour. IMO Helen is the greatest female vocalist of our times.

Besides a great voice, incredibly sexy young woman. If she was not so young, John Lennon would have been all over her. Don’t’ know why she did not have success in the States.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

• Next story  Ringo in Boston
• Previous story  Under the covers DVD

About The Daily Beatle

This website is all about The Beatles and the individual members of The Beatles – news and articles. The text is © Roger Stormo, unless otherwise noted. We have no responsibility for links that go outside this blog.

Subscribe to new posts via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to our site and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Email Address

Special Pages

• Abbey Road – The road that goes on forever
• The Beatles after The Beatles – solo gigs
• Paul McCartney – Music video collection 1970-2021 part 1
• Paul McCartney Music Videos 1970-2021 Part 2
• Ringo Starr: Music videos
• George Harrison: music videos
• The Beatles: Music Videos
• John Lennon: Music videos
• Living the Beatles Legend

Recent Comments

• Dennis Carmichael on Beryl Williams
• Ian Beaumont on Let It Be – at last
• admin on Let It Be – at last
• binance kód on Paul Live at the Cavern Club 2018 coming up
• Tim W on Let It Be – at last
• wizz on 1974 Wings album coming?
• Blakey on Let It Be – at last
• angellus8e9025cca8 on Let It Be – at last
• Tony Littman on 1974 Wings album coming?

• Newsletters
• Account Activating this button will toggle the display of additional content Account Sign out

The Beatles Are an Opening Band

Brow Beat is  following the Beatles in “real time,”  50 years later, from their first chart-topper to their final rooftop concert. In our latest weekly installment, we check in with the group as they head out on tour, in support of Helen Shapiro.

Still from YouTube.

Fifty years ago this week, the Beatles were an opening band. They were about to set out on what would become a grueling year of touring, and, on their first tour, they were listed dead-last on a six-band bill. The headliner was the far more popular Helen Shapiro, who was only 16 or 17 years old. The response to their early shows was often tepid, but they were eager for whatever exposure they could get. “Someone saying he was called Brian Epstein was ringing from Liverpool,” promoter Arthur Howes later recalled. “ He said he had a great group, was there anything I could fit them into? ” Howes remembers them as just “another group with a funny name,” but he booked them with the simple hope of turning a profit.

The English countryside was a bit dull for the band just back from their wild days in Hamburg . During the long bus rides, Lennon and McCartney would move to the back of the bus to work on new songs, often in hopes of selling those songs to Shapiro and others. But Ringo still recalls that they were happy to be there. “ Helen was the star ,” Starr said. “She had the telly in her dressing room and we didn’t have one. We had to ask her if we could watch hers. We weren’t getting packed houses, but we were on the boards, man.” You can get a sense of what the tour was like from this 1963 clip from Ready, Steady, Go! While the clip is from the following fall, it’s still Shapiro who takes center stage for the performance, as she serenades Lennon, Starr, and Harrison in turn. (Paul apparently lost the coin toss but can be spotted in the background.) The Beatles display a characteristically mischievous sense of humor, but Shapiro is unquestionably the star:

When the Beatles finally hit No. 1 with “ Please Please Me ,” in the middle of the tour, things began to change. Soon they were getting as much applause as the headliner—and this created some tension. “All the people coming to the show were just waiting for The Beatles,” Harrison later remembered. “ It was embarrassing, because she was a very nice person .” This is characteristic of the Beatles’ relationship with Shapiro. They liked her, and she even had a crush on John (who was secretly a married man), but he dismissed her music as “ mush .” A few months later they toured with one of their heroes, Roy Orbison. They shared top billing. Previously in Blogging the Beatles Where’s Yoko? On John Cage’s Piano Edition How a Black Label Brought the Beatles to America The Beatles Say Goodbye to Hamburg The Beatles Hit the Airwaves The Beatles Rise Up the Charts The Beatles Record Their First No. 1

The Beatles Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour

• Edit source
• View history

The Beatles' first English tour lasted from 2 February 1963 until 3 March 1963. The Beatles were fourth on an eleven-act bill headed by 16-year-old Londoner, Helen Shapiro. Other acts on the tour were the Red Price Band, The Kestrels, The Honeys (UK), Dave Allen, Kenny Lynch and Danny Williams. They were also joined briefly by Billie Davis during the latter part of the tour.

The tour was organised by the Arthur Howes Agency. This was the first time that the Beatles had worked with Howes.

Programme [ ]

The programme for the tour was:

• Red Price Band
• The Beatles
• Danny Williams
• The Kestrels
• Kenny Lynch
• Helen Shapiro

Set list [ ]

The Beatles typical set list for the shows was as follows (with lead singers noted):

• "Chains" (George Harrison)
• "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" (John Lennon)
• "A Taste of Honey" (Paul McCartney)
• "Please Please Me" (John Lennon / Paul McCartney)

Two other songs were used as prepared alternatives during the tour:

• "Love Me Do" (Paul McCartney / John Lennon)
• "Beautiful Dreamer" (Paul McCartney)

The Beatles Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour

1963 concert tour by the beatles / from wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, dear wikiwand ai, let's keep it short by simply answering these key questions:.

Can you list the top facts and stats about The Beatles Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour?

Summarize this article for a 10 year old

The Beatles ' first English tour lasted from 2 February 1963 until 3 March 1963. The Beatles were fourth on an eleven-act bill headed by 16-year-old Londoner, Helen Shapiro . Other acts on the tour were the Red Price Band, The Kestrels , The Honeys (UK) , Dave Allen , Kenny Lynch and Danny Williams . [1] They were also joined briefly by Billie Davis during the latter part of the tour. [2]

The tour was organised by the Arthur Howes Agency . This was the first time that the Beatles had worked with Howes. [3]

The Beatles Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour

The Beatles ' first English tour lasted from 2 February 1963 until 3 March 1963. The Beatles were fourth on an eleven-act bill headed by 16-year-old Londoner, Helen Shapiro . Other acts on the tour were the Red Price Band, The Kestrels , The Honeys (UK) , Dave Allen , Kenny Lynch and Danny Williams . [1] They were also joined briefly by Billie Davis during the latter part of the tour. [2]

Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour dates

Instruments and equipment.

The tour was organised by the Arthur Howes Agency . This was the first time that the Beatles had worked with Howes. [3]

The programme for the tour [1] was:

• Red Price Band
• The Beatles
• Danny Williams
• The Kestrels
• Kenny Lynch
• Helen Shapiro

The Beatles typical set list [1] for the shows was as follows (with lead singers noted): [4]

• " Chains " ( George Harrison )
• " Keep Your Hands Off My Baby " ( John Lennon )
• " A Taste of Honey " (Paul McCartney)
• " Please Please Me " (John Lennon / Paul McCartney)

Two other songs were used as prepared alternatives during the tour:

• " Love Me Do " (Paul McCartney / John Lennon)
• " Beautiful Dreamer " (Paul McCartney)

The Shapiro tour was split into two parts.

The first part lasted from 2 to 10 February, although the Beatles did not play on the 10th, as they needed to be in London early on the 11th. The Beatles played two dates at the Cavern Club , Liverpool on 3 and 4 February, before joining the Shapiro tour again on the 5th.

All dates from Lewisohn [5]

On 11 February, the Beatles recorded the ten tracks that, together with their two previously released singles, formed their debut album, Please Please Me . From 12 to 22 February, they played a number of dates on their own, before joining the Shapiro tour again on the 23.

The second part lasted from 23 February until 3 March. Travelling to Shrewsbury on 28 February 1963, Lennon and McCartney wrote the next Beatles single, " From Me To You ".

Instruments The Beatles had on the tour, shown here for each member of the group. [6]

John Lennon

• 1958 Rickenbacker 325 electric guitar
• 1962 [7] Gibson J-160E electro-acoustic guitar (used as backup)
• 1962 [8] Vox AC-30 amplifier

Paul McCartney

• 1961 Höfner 500/1 hollowbody Violin bass
• Quad II/22 Amp modified by Adrian Barber
• 1962 Adrian Barber "Coffin" speaker cabinet [9]

George Harrison

• 1957 [10] Gretsch Duo Jet hollowbody electric guitar

Ringo Starr

• 20×17" bass drum
• 12×8" rack tom
• 16×16" floor tom
• 14×4" Premier Royal Ace wood-shell snare drum
• List of the Beatles' live performances

Related Research Articles

Please Please Me is the debut studio album by the English rock band the Beatles. Produced by George Martin, it was released in the UK on EMI's Parlophone label on 22 March 1963. The album is 14 songs in length, and contains a mixture of cover songs and original material written by the partnership of the band's John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

Beatles for Sale is the fourth studio album by the English rock band the Beatles. It was released on 4 December 1964 in the United Kingdom on EMI's Parlophone label. The album marked a departure from the upbeat tone that had characterised the Beatles' previous work, partly due to the band's exhaustion after a series of tours that had established them as a worldwide phenomenon in 1964. Beatles for Sale was not widely available in the US until 1987, when the Beatles' catalogue was standardised for release on CD. Instead, eight of the album's fourteen tracks appeared on Capitol Records' concurrent release, Beatles '65 , issued in North America only.

" From Me to You " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles that was released in April 1963 as their third single. It was written by Paul McCartney and John Lennon. The song was the Beatles' first number 1 hit on what became the official UK singles chart but the second, after "Please Please Me", on most of the other singles charts published in the UK at the time. "From Me to You" failed to make an impact in the United States at the time of its initial release. Instead, a 1963 cover version released by Del Shannon resulted in the song becoming the first Lennon–McCartney tune to enter the US pop charts. The Beatles' original was rereleased in the US in January 1964 as the b-side to "Please Please Me", and reached number 41.

" Love Me Do " is the official debut single by the English rock band the Beatles, backed by "P.S. I Love You". When the single was originally released in the United Kingdom on 5 October 1962, it peaked at number 17. It was released in the United States in 1964, where it became a number one hit. Re-released in 1982 as part of EMI's Beatles 20th anniversary, it re-entered the UK charts and peaked at number 4.

" I'm Only Sleeping " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1966 studio album Revolver . In the United States and Canada, it was one of the three tracks that Capitol Records cut from the album and instead included on Yesterday and Today , released two months before Revolver . Credited as a Lennon–McCartney song, it was written primarily by John Lennon. The track includes a backwards lead guitar part played by George Harrison, the first time such a technique was used on a pop recording.

" Please Please Me " is a song released by the English rock band the Beatles. It was their second single in the United Kingdom, and their first in the United States. It is also the title track of their first LP, which was recorded to capitalise on the success of the single. It is a John Lennon composition, although its ultimate form was significantly influenced by producer George Martin.

" Dear Prudence " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1968 double album The Beatles . The song was written by John Lennon and credited to the Lennon–McCartney partnership. Written in Rishikesh during the group's trip to India in early 1968, it was inspired by actress Mia Farrow's sister, Prudence Farrow, who became obsessive about meditating while practising with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Her designated partners on the meditation course, Lennon and George Harrison, attempted to coax Farrow out of her seclusion, which led to Lennon writing the song.

" And I Love Her " is a song recorded by English rock band the Beatles, written primarily by Paul McCartney and credited to the Lennon–McCartney partnership. It is the fifth track of their third UK album A Hard Day's Night and was released 20 July 1964, along with "If I Fell", as a single release by Capitol Records in the United States, reaching No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100 .

" I Saw Her Standing There " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles written by Paul McCartney and John Lennon. It is the opening track on the band's 1963 debut UK album Please Please Me and their debut US album Introducing... The Beatles .

" Misery " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1963 debut album Please Please Me . It was co-written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney. According to Lennon, "It was kind of a John song more than a Paul song, but it was written together." McCartney was to say: "I don't think either one of us dominated on that one, it was just a hacking job."

" Ask Me Why " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles originally released in the United Kingdom as the B-side of their single "Please Please Me". It was also included on their 1963 debut album Please Please Me . It was written primarily by John Lennon and credited to the Lennon–McCartney partnership.

" There's a Place " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their debut album, Please Please Me , released in March 1963. It was written primarily by John Lennon and credited to McCartney–Lennon. In the United States, the song was released in July 1963 on the group's first US LP, Introducing... The Beatles , later reissued in January 1964 as Beatlemania surged there. It was also issued as a non-album single in the US, in March 1964, as the B-side to "Twist and Shout", reaching number 74 in the Billboard Hot 100 .

" Old Brown Shoe " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. Written by George Harrison, the group's lead guitarist, it was released on a non-album single in May 1969, as the B-side to "The Ballad of John and Yoko". The song was subsequently included on the band's compilation albums Hey Jude , 1967–1970 and Past Masters, Volume Two . Although "Old Brown Shoe" remains a relatively obscure song in the band's catalogue, several music critics view it as one of Harrison's best compositions from the Beatles era and especially admire his guitar solo on the track.

" I'm Down " is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released on a non-album single as the B-side to "Help!" in July 1965. The song originated in McCartney's attempt to write a song in the style of Little Richard, whose song "Long Tall Sally" the band regularly covered.

The Beatles staged their second concert tour of the United States in the late summer of 1965. At the peak of American Beatlemania, they played a mixture of outdoor stadiums and indoor arenas, with historic concerts at Shea Stadium in New York and the Hollywood Bowl. Typically of the era, the tour was a "package" presentation, with several artists on the bill. The Beatles played for just 30 minutes at each show, following sets by support acts such as Brenda Holloway and the King Curtis Band, Cannibal & the Headhunters, and Sounds Incorporated.

Sir James Paul McCartney is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained worldwide fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John Lennon. One of the most successful composers and performers of all time, McCartney is known for his melodic approach to bass-playing, versatile and wide tenor vocal range, and musical eclecticism, exploring genres ranging from pre–rock and roll pop to classical, ballads, and electronica. His songwriting partnership with Lennon remains the most successful in history.

During 1965, the Beatles toured Europe.

The Roy Orbison/The Beatles Tour was a 1963 concert tour of the United Kingdom by Roy Orbison and the Beatles. Other acts on the tour included Gerry and the Pacemakers, David MacBeth, Louise Cordet, Tony Marsh, Terry Young Six, Erkey Grant, and Ian Crawford. It was Orbison's first, and the Beatles' third nationwide tour of the UK. Although Orbison was originally intended to be the headlining act, the reaction to the Beatles on the tour caused them to be promoted to co-headliners, with the Beatles closing the set in the traditional headlining spot.

• 1 2 3 Lewisohn 1996 , p.   98.
• ↑ Lewisohn 1996 , p.   101.
• ↑ The Beatles 2000 , p.   89.
• ↑ Lewisohn 1996 , pp.   361–365.
• 1 2 Lewisohn 1996 , pp.   98–102.
• ↑ Babiuk 2002 , p.   81.
• 1 2 Babiuk 2002 , p.   72.
• 1 2 Babiuk 2002 , p.   67.
• ↑ Babiuk 2002 , p.   64.
• ↑ Babiuk 2002 , p.   53.
• ↑ Babiuk 2002 , p.   70.
• The Beatles (2000). The Beatles Anthology . San Francisco: Chronicle Books. ISBN   0-8118-2684-8 .
• Babiuk, Andy (2002). Beatles Gear . San Francisco: Backbeat Books . ISBN   0-87930-731-5 .
• .mw-parser-output .navbar{display:inline;font-size:88%;font-weight:normal}.mw-parser-output .navbar-collapse{float:left;text-align:left}.mw-parser-output .navbar-boxtext{word-spacing:0}.mw-parser-output .navbar ul{display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;line-height:inherit}.mw-parser-output .navbar-brackets::before{margin-right:-0.125em;content:"[ "}.mw-parser-output .navbar-brackets::after{margin-left:-0.125em;content:" ]"}.mw-parser-output .navbar li{word-spacing:-0.125em}.mw-parser-output .navbar a>span,.mw-parser-output .navbar a>abbr{text-decoration:inherit}.mw-parser-output .navbar-mini abbr{font-variant:small-caps;border-bottom:none;text-decoration:none;cursor:inherit}.mw-parser-output .navbar-ct-full{font-size:114%;margin:0 7em}.mw-parser-output .navbar-ct-mini{font-size:114%;margin:0 4em} v
• " From Me to You "
• " Thank You Girl "
• " How Do You Do It? "
• " Tip of My Tongue "
• " Hold Me Tight "
• " Bésame Mucho "
• " One After 909 "
• " What Goes On "
• Twist and Shout
• The Beatles (No. 1)
• Souvenir of Their Visit to America
• Introducing... The Beatles
• The Early Beatles
• Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour
• 1963 Tour with Roy Orbison
• The Beatles discography
• Please Please Me
• With the Beatles
• A Hard Day's Night
• Beatles for Sale
• Rubber Soul
• Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
• Magical Mystery Tour
• The Beatles (White Album)
• Yellow Submarine

Bedford • Wednesday, February 6, 1963

Band members

Paul McCartney

Ringo Starr

John Lennon

George Harrison

Spread the love! If you like what you are seeing, share it on social networks and let others know about The Paul McCartney Project.

Last updated on April 27, 2019

This was the 1st and only concert played at Granada.

Too bad, there is no song listed for this concert. If you've been there, help us fill the set list for this concert by writing a comment!

Contribute.

Have you spotted an error on the page? Do you want to suggest new content? Or do you simply want to leave a comment ? Please use the form below!

Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

The Beatles live: Gaumont Cinema, Bradford

On this day The Beatles embarked on the first date of their debut UK tour, at the Gaumont Cinema in Bradford, Yorkshire.

The Beatles were effectively at the bottom of a six-act bill, headlined by 16-year-old singer Helen Shapiro. The tour coincided with the release of her single Queen For Today, which she hoped would revive her already flagging career.

I’d had a meeting with Arthur [promoter Arthur Howes] and he’d said that for this new tour I’d be accompanied by Danny Williams and Kenny Lynch and that The Red Price Combo would be my backing band. Dave Allen would be the compere and there would also be this new group called The Beatles. He asked if I’d heard of them and of course, I had. I loved their song Love Me Do and I was looking forward to the tour. Dave Allen didn’t have a halfpenny to his name in those days, but he was a lovely guy and very funny. I was always touring with Danny and Kenny, and so I knew them well.

Most of the touring musicians set off from the bus depot at Allsop Place in London, and made the long journey to Yorkshire. The top temperature in the county that day was -1°C, and snow and ice made it a hazardous trip.

The Beatles, meanwhile, had performed the previous night in Tamworth and Sutton Coldfield, and travelled to Bradford in Neil Aspinall ’s Commer van.

During the tour there were two shows each night, at 6.15pm and 8.30pm. The Gaumont Cinema held 3,318 people, and a number of the seats for the first house were empty.

The shows opened with The Red Price Band, then The Honeys. Compere Dave Allen then introduced The Beatles, and Danny Williams closed the first half. After an interval The Red Price Band performed once more, followed by The Kestrels, Kenny Lynch and Helen Shapiro. The compere was Dave Allen.

The Beatles performed six songs on this first night of the tour: ‘Love Me Do’ , Beautiful Dreamer, ‘Chains’ , ‘Keep Your Hands Off My Baby’ , ‘A Taste Of Honey’ and ‘Please Please Me’ .

As the tour progressed and they occasionally also played ‘Long Tall Sally’ .

Helen had the star dressing room downstairs, but you had to go up the steps to the small room The Beatles were in that night. You couldn’t swing the proverbial cat in it. As I recall, we were all stood up. They were sort of propped up by the small mirror – two at one end and two at the other, with Brian in the background. We were the only people in the room. We would just have talked about the usual things – their recording plans, what it was like to be on a national tour in the spotlight, that kind of thing. They were very friendly and a bit of a laugh, but there was no mickey-taking or anything like that. They were very polite.

Stan Richardson, a freelance photographer, was covering the first show with a reporter for the Melody Maker. Brian Epstein asked him to take a picture of The Beatles, but he initially refused as bands often failed to pay for photographs. They eventually persuaded him to take their picture, and between shows he went home and developed a 20″x16″ print which he brought back for the group to sign.

The picture was taken in the foyer. We were trying to get a picture and interview with Helen, but she refused. Then these Liverpool lads piped up: ‘We’ll have our pictures taken.’ His Lordship [Epstein] was there in his white suit and pink carnation and he said, ‘Come on, come on, take a picture of my boys.’ I went home and processed it and returned for the end of the second house. I remember Epstein putting his arm around me and saying, ‘Oh darling, I want you to take a whole set of pictures of my boys.’ I refused. It sounds crazy now, but I’d taken pictures of pop stars before and you hardly ever got paid. The only time I ever got paid was when I took pictures of Lulu. Her people paid up straight away.

Also on this day the ‘Please Please Me’ single entered the Music Week chart at number 16.

Brian Epstein put us in suits and all that, and we made it very, very big. We sold out. The music was dead before we even went on the theatre tour of Britain. We were feeling shit already because we had to reduce an hour or two hours’ play – and which we were glad in one way – to twenty minutes, and go on and repeat the same twenty minutes every night. The Beatles’ music died then, as musicians. That’s why we never improved as musicians. We killed ourselves then to make it – and that was the end of it. George and I are more inclined to say that. We always missed the club dates ’cause that’s when we were playing music.

Also on this day...

• 1993: UK album release: Off The Ground by Paul McCartney
• 1990: Paul McCartney live: The Palace, Auburn Hills
• 1970: Ringo and Maureen return to London from New York
• 1968: Ringo Starr rehearses for Cilla Black’s television show
• 1968: Tape copying: Only A Northern Song
• 1967: Recording, mixing: Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
• 1964: The Beatles live: Olympia Theatre, Paris
• 1962: The Beatles live: Oasis Club, Manchester
• 1961: The Beatles live: Litherland Town Hall, Liverpool

Want more? Visit the Beatles history section .

Latest Comments

The Gaumont is now under threat of demolition despite The Beatles playing there again on John Lennon’s 24th Birthday. This piece of Beatles history needs protecting for future generations to enjoy. Please join us in trying to prevent the demolition of this beautiful building. BORG – Bradford Odeon Rescue Group

If you wish to help go to our websites: savetheodeon.wordpress.com http://www.bradfordodeonrescuegroup.co.uk

OR find us on facebook (save our odeon)

I’ve actually got a numbered limited edition facsimile of the picture Stan Richardson took showing the four Beatles signatures and the border is signed by Stan. Often wondered what its value is.

John didn’t know what he was talking about when he said they didn’t improve as musicians – if you listen to their recordings from their first album “Please Please Me” up until “Abbey Road” (“Let it Be” was recorded earlier), they clearly evolved, developed and improved as musicians in addition to charting new musical territory, innovating and trying new ideas – so for him to suggest that they never improved as musicians is patently untrue. That description is more applicable to Pete Best, because he clearly had a very limited drumming technique and would almost invariably play in one style.

It must be kept in mind that when he did his infamous Rolling Stone interview in 1970 with Jann S. Wenner, he made a lot of angry utterances, no doubt coloured by the breakup of The Beatles still fresh in his mind and he was undergoing Primal Scream therapy with Dr. Arthur Janov (I’m not sure if he’d finished the course or had abandoned it by then), but he later recanted and said that he no longer meant much of the things he had said. With his talk of selling out, did he want them to be a cult band with poor record sales and no hit records like The Velvet Underground, Captain Beefheart or The Mothers of Invention or did he want The Beatles to be the biggest band in the world during the 60’s and make money and buy all these nice houses, cars and things for themselves as well as relatives in addition to enjoying celebrity status? I didn’t realize that they played like two hour or half-hour sets or shows per date, which effectively made it two sets per date, and I used to think it was a ridiculously short single half-hour set per date.

Leave a Reply

• Recent Photos
• The Commons
• Flickr Galleries
• Camera Finder
• Flickr Blog
• The Print Shop
• Prints & Wall Art
• Photo Books
• Stats Dashboard
• Get Auto-Uploadr

The Beatles Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour

The Beatles first UK nationwide tour lasted from 2 February 1963 until 3 March 1963. The Beatles were fourth on an eleven-act bill headed by 16-year-old Londoner, Helen Shapiro . Other acts on the tour were the Red Price Band, The Kestrels , The Honeys(UK), Dave Allen , Kenny Lynch and Danny Williams. They were also joined briefly by Billie Davis during the latter part of the tour.

Winter 1963 Helen Shapiro Tour dates

Instruments and equipment.

The tour was organised by the Arthur Howes Agency. This was the first time that the Beatles had worked with Howes.

The programme for the tour was:

• Red Price Band
• The Beatles
• Danny Williams
• The Kestrels
• Kenny Lynch
• Helen Shapiro

The Beatles typical set list for the shows was as follows (with lead singers noted):

• "Chains" ( George Harrison )
• "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" ( John Lennon )
• " A Taste of Honey " (Paul McCartney )
• " Please Please Me " (John Lennon / Paul McCartney)

Two other songs were used as prepared alternatives during the tour:

• " Love Me Do " (John Lennon)
• " Beautiful Dreamer " (Paul McCartney)

The Shapiro tour was split into two parts.

The first part lasted from the 2nd to 10 February, although the Beatles did not play on the 10th, as they needed to be in London early on the 11th. The Beatles played two dates at the Cavern Club, Liverpool on 3 and 4 February, before joining the Shapiro tour again on the 5th.

All dates from Lewisohn

On 11 February, the Beatles recorded the ten tracks that, together with their two previously released singles, formed their debut album, Please Please Me . From 12 to 22 February, they played a number of dates on their own, before joining the Shapiro tour again on the 23.

The second part lasted from 23 February until 3 March. Travelling to Shrewsbury on 28 February 1963, Lennon and McCartney wrote the next Beatles single, "From Me To You".

Instruments The Beatles had on the tour, shown here for each member of the group.

John Lennon

• 1958 Rickenbacker 325 electric guitar
• 1962 Gibson J-160E electro-acoustic guitar (used as backup)
• 1962 Vox AC-30 amplifier

Paul McCartney

• 1961 Hofner 500/1 hollowbody Violin bass
• Quad II/22 Amp modified by Adrian Barber
• 1962 Adrian Barber "Coffin" speaker cabinet

George Harrison

• 1957 Gretsch Duo Jet hollowbody electric guitar

Ringo Starr

• Premier Mahogany drum kit
• 20x17" bass drum
• 12x8" rack tom
• 16x16" floor tom
• 14x4" Premier Royal Ace wood-shell snare drum