1.
John Lennon
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John Winston Ono Lennon, MBE was an English singer and songwriter who co-founded the Beatles, the most commercially successful and musically influential band in the history of popular music. He and fellow member Paul McCartney formed a songwriting partnership. Born and raised in Liverpool, Lennon became involved in the craze as a teenager, his first band, the Quarrymen, first became the Silver Beatles. After his marriage to Yoko Ono in 1969, he added Ono as one of his middle names, Lennon disengaged himself from the music business in 1975 to raise his infant son Sean, but re-emerged with Ono in 1980 with the new album Double Fantasy. He was murdered three weeks after its release, Lennon revealed a rebellious nature and acerbic wit in his music, writing, drawings, on film and in interviews. By 2012, Lennons solo album sales in the United States exceeded 14 million and, as writer, co-writer, or performer, he is responsible for 25 number-one singles on the US Hot 100 chart. In 2002, a BBC poll on the 100 Greatest Britons voted him eighth and, in 2008, Rolling Stone ranked him the fifth-greatest singer of all time. He was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987, and into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, in 1988 as a member of the Beatles and in 1994 as a solo artist. Lennon was born in war-time England, on 9 October 1940 at Liverpool Maternity Hospital, to Julia and Alfred Lennon, a merchant seaman of Irish descent and his parents named him John Winston Lennon after his paternal grandfather, John Jack Lennon, and then-Prime Minister Winston Churchill. When he eventually came home six months later, he offered to look after the family, after her sister, Mimi Smith, twice complained to Liverpools Social Services, Julia handed the care of Lennon over to her. In July 1946 Lennons father visited Smith and took his son to Blackpool, Julia followed them—with her partner at the time, Bobby Dykins—and after a heated argument his father forced the five-year-old to choose between them. Lennon twice chose his father, but as his mother walked away, he began to cry and followed her, according to author Mark Lewisohn, Lennons parents agreed that Julia should take him and give him a home as Alf left again. A witness who was there that day, Billy Hall, has said the scene often portrayed with a young John Lennon having to make a decision between his parents never happened. It would be 20 years before he had contact with his father again, Throughout the rest of his childhood and adolescence he lived at Mendips,251 Menlove Avenue, Woolton with his aunt and uncle, Mimi and George Smith, who had no children of their own. His aunt purchased volumes of stories for him, and his uncle. In September 1980, Lennon commented about his family and his rebellious nature, Part of me would like to be accepted by all facets of society, but I cannot be what I am not. I was the one who all the other boys parents—including Pauls father—would say, the parents instinctively recognised I was a troublemaker, meaning I did not conform and I would influence their children, which I did. I did my best to disrupt every friends home, partly out of envy that I didnt have this so-called home
2.
The Beatles
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The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960. With members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, the Beatles built their reputation playing clubs in Liverpool and Hamburg over a three-year period from 1960, with Stuart Sutcliffe initially serving as bass player. The core of Lennon, McCartney and Harrison went through a succession of drummers, including Pete Best, before asking Starr to join them. They acquired the nickname the Fab Four as Beatlemania grew in Britain the next year, from 1965 onwards, the Beatles produced increasingly innovative recordings, including the albums Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles and Abbey Road, after their break-up in 1970, they each enjoyed successful musical careers of varying lengths. McCartney and Starr, the members, remain musically active. Lennon was shot and killed in December 1980, and Harrison died of cancer in November 2001. The Beatles are the band in history, with estimated sales of over 600 million records worldwide. They have had more number-one albums on the British charts and sold more singles in the UK than any other act, according to the RIAA, the Beatles are also the best-selling music artists in the United States, with 178 million certified units. In 2008, the group topped Billboard magazines list of the all-time most successful Hot 100 artists, as of 2016 and they have received ten Grammy Awards, an Academy Award for Best Original Song Score and fifteen Ivor Novello Awards. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988 and they were also collectively included in Time magazines compilation of the twentieth centurys 100 most influential people. In March 1957, John Lennon, then aged sixteen, formed a group with several friends from Quarry Bank school. They briefly called themselves the Blackjacks, before changing their name to the Quarrymen after discovering that a local group was already using the other name. Fifteen-year-old Paul McCartney joined as a rhythm guitarist shortly after he, in February 1958, McCartney invited his friend George Harrison to watch the band. The fourteen-year-old auditioned for Lennon, impressing him with his playing, after a month of Harrisons persistence, they enlisted him as their lead guitarist. By January 1959, Lennons Quarry Bank friends had left the group, the three guitarists, billing themselves at least three times as Johnny and the Moondogs, were playing rock and roll whenever they could find a drummer. They used the name until May, when they became the Silver Beetles, before undertaking a tour of Scotland as the backing group for pop singer. By early July, they had changed their name to the Silver Beatles, allan Williams, the Beatles unofficial manager, arranged a residency for them in Hamburg, but lacking a full-time drummer they auditioned and hired Pete Best in mid-August 1960
3.
Warner Bros.
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Entertainment Inc. – colloquially known as Warner Bros. or Warner Bros. It is one of the Big Six major American film studios, Warner Bros. is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America. The companys name originated from the four founding Warner brothers, Harry, Albert, Sam, Jack, the youngest, was born in London, Ontario. The three elder brothers began in the theater business, having acquired a movie projector with which they showed films in the mining towns of Pennsylvania. In the beginning, Sam and Albert Warner invested $150 to present Life of an American Fireman and they opened their first theater, the Cascade, in New Castle, Pennsylvania, in 1903. When the original building was in danger of being demolished, the modern Warner Bros. called the current building owners, the owners noted people across the country had asked them to protect it for its historical significance. In 1904, the Warners founded the Pittsburgh-based Duquesne Amusement & Supply Company, in 1912, Harry Warner hired an auditor named Paul Ashley Chase. By the time of World War I they had begun producing films, in 1918 they opened the first Warner Bros. studio on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Sam and Jack produced the pictures, while Harry and Albert, along with their auditor and now controller Chase, handled finance and distribution in New York City. During World War I their first nationally syndicated film, My Four Years in Germany, on April 4,1923, with help from money loaned to Harry by his banker Motley Flint, they formally incorporated as Warner Brothers Pictures, Incorporated. The first important deal was the acquisition of the rights to Avery Hopwoods 1919 Broadway play, The Gold Diggers, however, Rin Tin Tin, a dog brought from France after World War I by an American soldier, established their reputation. Rin Tin Tin debuted in the feature Where the North Begins, the movie was so successful that Jack signed the dog to star in more films for $1,000 per week. Rin Tin Tin became the top star. Jack nicknamed him The Mortgage Lifter and the success boosted Darryl F. Zanucks career, Zanuck eventually became a top producer and between 1928 and 1933 served as Jacks right-hand man and executive producer, with responsibilities including day-to-day film production. More success came after Ernst Lubitsch was hired as head director, lubitschs film The Marriage Circle was the studios most successful film of 1924, and was on The New York Times best list for that year. Despite the success of Rin Tin Tin and Lubitsch, Warners remained a lesser studio, Sam and Jack decided to offer Broadway actor John Barrymore the lead role in Beau Brummel. The film was so successful that Harry signed Barrymore to a contract, like The Marriage Circle. By the end of 1924, Warner Bros. was arguably Hollywoods most successful independent studio, as the studio prospered, it gained backing from Wall Street, and in 1924 Goldman Sachs arranged a major loan
4.
Yoko Ono
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Yoko Ono is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, and peace activist who is also known for her work in performance art and filmmaking. She is the wife and widow of singer-songwriter John Lennon of the Beatles. Ono grew up in Tokyo, and studied at Gakushuin and she withdrew from her course after two years and rejoined her family in New York in 1953. She spent some time at Sarah Lawrence College, and then involved in New York Citys downtown artists scene. She first met Lennon in 1966 at her own art exhibition in London and she brought feminism to the forefront in her music, influencing artists as diverse as the B-52s and Meredith Monk. Ono achieved commercial and critical acclaim in 1980 with the chart-topping album Double Fantasy, public appreciation of Onos work has shifted over time, helped by a retrospective at a Whitney Museum branch in 1989 and the 1992 release of the six-disc box set Onobox. She received a Golden Lion Award for lifetime achievement from the Venice Biennale in 2009, as Lennons widow, Ono works to preserve his legacy. She funded Strawberry Fields in New York City, the Imagine Peace Tower in Iceland, and she has made significant philanthropic contributions to the arts, peace, Philippine and Japan disaster relief, and other causes. In 2012 Yoko Ono received the Dr. Rainer Hildebrandt Human Rights Award endowed by Alexandra Hildebrandt, the award is given annually in recognition of extraordinary, non-violent commitment to human rights. Ono continues her activism, inaugurating a biennial $50,000 LennonOno Grant for Peace in 2002. She has a daughter, Kyoko Chan Cox, from her marriage to Anthony Cox, Ono was born on February 18,1933, in Tokyo, to Isoko Ono and Eisuke Ono, a banker and former classical pianist. Isokos father was ennobled in 1915, isokos maternal grandfather Zenjiro Yasuda was an affiliate of the Yasuda clan and zaibatsu. Eisuke came from a line of samurai warrior-scholars. The kanji translation of Yokos first name Yoko means ocean child, Two weeks before Yokos birth, Eisuke was transferred to San Francisco by his employer, the Yokohama Specie Bank. The rest of the family followed soon after, with Yoko meeting Eisuke when she was two and her younger brother Keisuke was born in December 1936. Yoko was enrolled in piano lessons from the age of 4, in 1937, the family was transferred back to Japan and Ono enrolled at Tokyos Gakushuin, one of the most exclusive schools in Japan. In 1940, the moved to New York City. The next year, Eisuke was transferred from New York City to Hanoi, Ono was enrolled in Keimei Gakuen, an exclusive Christian primary school run by the Mitsui family
5.
Imagine (John Lennon song)
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Imagine is a song written and performed by English musician John Lennon. Lennon and Yoko Ono co-produced the song and album of the name with Phil Spector. Recording began at Lennons home studio at Tittenhurst Park, England, in May 1971, with final overdubs taking place at the Record Plant, in New York City, during July. Although not originally released as a single in the United Kingdom, it was released in 1975 to promote a compilation LP, the song has since sold more than 1.6 million copies in the UK, it reached number one following Lennons murder in December 1980. In 1985, the Central Park Conservancy memorialized a portion of the park in honor of Lennon, called Strawberry Fields, BMI named Imagine one of the 100 most-performed songs of the 20th century. The song ranked number 30 on the Recording Industry Association of Americas list of the 365 Songs of the Century bearing the most historical significance. It earned a Grammy Hall of Fame Award and an induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fames 500 Songs that Shaped Rock, since 2005, event organisers have played it just before the New Years Times Square Ball drops in New York City. Dozens of artists have performed or recorded versions of Imagine, including Madonna, Stevie Wonder, Joan Baez, Elton John, Emeli Sandé recorded a cover for the BBC to use during the end credits montage at the close of the 2012 Summer Olympics coverage in August 2012. Imagine subsequently re-entered the UK Top 40, reaching number 18, Lennon later said the composition should be credited as a Lennon/Ono song. A lot of lyric and the concept—came from Yoko, but in those days I was a bit more selfish, a bit more macho, and I sort of omitted her contribution. If you can imagine a world at peace, with no denominations of religion—not without religion, the World Church called me once and asked, Can we use the lyrics to Imagine and just change it to Imagine one religion. That showed they didnt understand it at all and it would defeat the whole purpose of the song, the whole idea. With the combined influence of Cloud Piece and the book given to him by Gregory. Blaney wrote, Lennon contends that global harmony is within our reach, in the opinion of Blaney, with Imagine, Lennon attempted to raise peoples awareness of their interaction with the institutions that affect their lives. Rolling Stones David Fricke commented, calls for a unity and equality built upon the elimination of modern social order, geopolitical borders, organised religion. He told NME, There is no real Communist state in the world, Not the way some daft Russian might do it, or the Chinese might do it. Us, we should have a nice, Ono described the lyrical statement of Imagine as just what John believed, that we are all one country, one world, one people. Rolling Stone described its lyrics as 22 lines of graceful, plain-spoken faith in the power of a world, united in purpose, to repair and change itself
6.
Paul McCartney
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Sir James Paul McCartney, MBE is an English singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and composer. With John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, he gained fame with the rock band the Beatles, largely considered the most popular. His songwriting partnership with Lennon is the most celebrated of the post-war era, after the bands break-up, he pursued a solo career and formed the band Wings with his first wife, Linda, and Denny Laine. McCartney has been recognised as one of the most successful composers and performers of all time, More than 2,200 artists have covered his Beatles song Yesterday, more than any other copyrighted song in history. Wings 1977 release Mull of Kintyre is one of the all-time best-selling singles in the UK.5 million RIAA-certified units in the United States. McCartney, Lennon, Harrison and Starr all received The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire in 1965, McCartney has released an extensive catalogue of songs as a solo artist and has composed classical and electronic music. He has taken part in projects to promote international charities related to subjects as animal rights, seal hunting, land mines, vegetarianism, poverty. He has married three times and is the father of five children, James Paul McCartney was born on 18 June 1942 in Walton Hospital, Liverpool, England, where his mother, Mary Patricia, had qualified to practise as a nurse. His father, James McCartney, was absent from his sons birth due to his work as a firefighter during World War II. Paul has one brother, Michael. Though the children were baptised in their mothers Catholic faith, their father was a former Protestant turned agnostic, McCartney attended Stockton Wood Road Primary School in Speke from 1947 until 1949, when he transferred to Joseph Williams Junior School in Belle Vale because of overcrowding at Stockton. In 1953, with three others out of ninety examinees, he passed the 11-Plus exam, meaning he could attend the Liverpool Institute. In 1954, he met schoolmate George Harrison on the bus from his home in Speke. The two quickly became friends, McCartney later admitted, I tended to talk down to him because he was a year younger. McCartneys mother Mary was a midwife and the primary wage earner, her earnings enabled them to move into 20 Forthlin Road in Allerton. She rode a bicycle to her patients, McCartney described an early memory of her leaving at about three in the morning streets, on 31 October 1956, when McCartney was fourteen, his mother died of an embolism. McCartneys loss later became a point of connection with John Lennon, whose mother, McCartneys father was a trumpet player and pianist, who had led Jim Macs Jazz Band in the 1920s. He kept a piano in the front room, encouraged his sons to be musical and advised Paul to take piano lessons
7.
George Harrison
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George Harrison, MBE was an English guitarist, singer, songwriter, and music and film producer who achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of the Beatles. Although most of the Beatles songs were written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney and his songs for the group included Taxman, Within You Without You, While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Here Comes the Sun and Something, the last of which became the Beatles second-most covered song. Harrisons earliest musical influences included George Formby and Django Reinhardt, Carl Perkins, Chet Atkins and Chuck Berry were subsequent influences. By 1965 he had begun to lead the Beatles into folk rock through his interest in the Byrds and Bob Dylan, having initiated the bands embracing of Transcendental Meditation in 1967, he subsequently developed an association with the Hare Krishna movement. He also organised the 1971 Concert for Bangladesh with Indian musician Ravi Shankar, in his role as a music and film producer, Harrison produced acts signed to the Beatles Apple record label before founding Dark Horse Records in 1974 and co-founding HandMade Films in 1978. Harrison released several best-selling singles and albums as a solo performer, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 11 in their list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. He is a two-time Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee – as a member of the Beatles in 1988, Harrisons first marriage, to model Pattie Boyd in 1966, ended in divorce in 1977. The following year he married Olivia Harrison, with whom he had one son, Harrison died in 2001, aged 58, from lung cancer. He was cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Ganges and Yamuna rivers in India and he left an estate of almost £100 million. Born in Liverpool, United Kingdom, on 25 February 1943, Harrison was the youngest of four children of Harold Hargreaves Harrison and he had one sister, Louise, and two brothers, Harry and Peter. His mother was an assistant from a Catholic family with Irish roots. His future wife, the model Pattie Boyd, described Harrisons parents as quite short, an enthusiastic music fan, she was known among friends for her loud singing voice, which at times startled visitors by rattling the Harrisons windows. While pregnant with George, she listened to the weekly broadcast Radio India. Harrisons biographer Joshua Greene wrote, Every Sunday she tuned in to mystical sounds evoked by sitars and tablas, hoping that the music would bring peace. Harrison was born and lived the first six years of his life at 12 Arnold Grove, Wavertree, Liverpool, the home had an outdoor toilet and its only heat came from a single coal fire. In 1949 the family were offered a house and moved to 25 Upton Green. In 1948, at the age of five, Harrison enrolled at Dovedale Primary School and he passed the eleven-plus exam and attended Liverpool Institute High School for Boys from 1954 to 1959. Though the institute did offer a course, Harrison was disappointed with the absence of guitars
8.
Ringo Starr
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Richard Starkey, MBE, known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, singer, songwriter and actor who gained worldwide fame as the drummer for the Beatles. He occasionally sang lead vocals, usually for one song on an album, including With a Little Help from My Friends, Yellow Submarine and their cover of Act Naturally. He also wrote the Beatles songs Dont Pass Me By and Octopuss Garden, Starr was twice afflicted by life-threatening illnesses during childhood, and as a result of prolonged hospitalisations fell behind in school. In 1955, he entered the workforce and briefly held a position with British Rail before securing an apprenticeship at a Liverpool equipment manufacturer, soon afterwards, he became interested in the UK skiffle craze, developing a fervent admiration for the genre. In 1957, he cofounded his first band, the Eddie Clayton Skiffle Group, when the Beatles formed in 1960, Starr was a member of another Liverpool group, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. After achieving moderate success with that band in the UK and Hamburg, he quit the Hurricanes and joined the Beatles in August 1962, Starr played key roles in the Beatles films and appeared in numerous others. After the bands break-up in 1970, he released several singles including the US number four hit It Dont Come Easy. In 1972, he released his most successful UK single, Back Off Boogaloo and he achieved commercial and critical success with his 1973 album Ringo, which was a top ten release in both the UK and the US. He has been featured in a number of documentaries and hosted television shows, since 1989, he has toured with twelve variations of Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band. Ringos popularity brought forth a new paradigm and we started to see the drummer as an equal participant in the compositional aspect. His parts are so signature to the songs that you can listen to a Ringo drum part without the rest of the music and he was inducted into the Modern Drummer Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2011, Rolling Stone readers named Starr the fifth-greatest drummer of all time. Starr, who was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a Beatle in 1988, was inducted for his solo career in 2015. Richard Starkey was born on 7 July 1940, at 9 Madryn Street, in Dingle and he is the only child of confectioners Elsie and Richard Starkey. Elsie enjoyed singing and dancing, a hobby that she shared with her husband, an avid fan of swing. Prior to the birth of their son, whom they nicknamed Ritchie, the couple had spent much of their time on the local ballroom circuit. Elsie adopted an approach to raising her son that bordered on fixation. Subsequently, Big Ritchie, as Starkeys father became known, lost interest in his family, choosing instead to spend hours drinking and dancing in pubs
9.
Rock 'n' Roll (John Lennon album)
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Rock n Roll is the sixth studio album by John Lennon. Released in 1975, it is an album of late 1950s, recording the album was problematic and spanned an entire year, Phil Spector produced sessions in October 1973 at A&M Studios, and Lennon produced sessions in October 1974 at Record Plant Studios. Lennon was being sued by Morris Levy over copyright infringement of one line in his song Come Together, as part of an agreement, Lennon had to include three Levy-owned songs on Rock n Roll. Spector ran away with the recordings, later being involved in a motor accident. With Walls and Bridges coming out first, featuring one Levy-owned song, the album was released in February 1975, reaching number 6 in both the United Kingdom and the United States, later being certified gold in both countries. It was supported by the single Stand by Me, which peaked at number 20 in the US, the cover was taken by Jürgen Vollmer during the Beatles stay in Hamburg. It was Lennons last album until 1980, With no recording contract obligation, in 1969, Lennon composed the song Come Together for the Beatles album Abbey Road. Inspired by the Chuck Berry tune You Cant Catch Me, it too much of a melodic resemblance to the original—and Lennon took the third line of the second verse for the new lyric. Publisher Morris Levy brought a lawsuit for infringement, and the case was due to be heard in a New York court in December 1973. It was later settled out of court, with the agreement that, according to an announcement by Levy, the songs intends to record at this time are You Cant Catch Me, Angel Baby and Ya Ya. Lennon had the right to change the last two songs to any other songs that were published by Big Seven, in the meanwhile, Lennon had split with Yoko Ono and was living in Los Angeles with his personal assistant, May Pang. Nostalgia was a trend on film with American Graffiti. Lennon initially teamed up with producer Phil Spector to record the album, Spector chose some of the songs, booked the studio, and the musicians. When news got around that Lennon was in Hollywood making a record, in mid-October 1973, sessions were booked at A&M Studios, with many of them having over 30 musicians, but the sessions quickly fell into disarray—fuelled by alcohol. Spector once showed up dressed in an outfit and shot a gun in the ceiling of the studio. On another occasion, a bottle of whiskey had spilled on the A&M Studios mixing console causing future sessions to be banned from the facility, unknown to Lennon, each night Spector would remove the master tapes from the studio, and move them to his house. Spector then disappeared with the tapes and would not be heard from for several months. Spector made one cryptic call to Lennon, claiming to have the John Dean tapes from the recent Watergate scandal, when a car accident on 31 March 1974 left Spector in a coma, the project was put on indefinite hold
10.
Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins
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1, Two Virgins is the first of three experimental albums released by John Lennon and Yoko Ono on Apple Records. It was the result of a session of musical experimentation with Yoko in Johns home studio at Kenwood, while his wife. In an attempt to avoid controversy, the LP record was sold in a paper bag, and distributed by Track and Tetragrammaton in the United Kingdom. Two Virgins, while failing to chart in the UK, reached number 124 in the US, the album was followed six months later by Unfinished Music No. John Lennon met Yoko Ono in November 1966 at the Indica Gallery in London after he received an invitation from its owner, John Dunbar, Lennon described the exhibition as positive and kept in touch with Ono. Two years later, Cynthia Lennon, feeling miserable and increasingly distanced from her husband, decided to go on holiday to Greece with her friends Jenny Boyd, whilst on his own, Lennon called Ono and invited her over for the night. Lennon then played her some of his tapes which consisted of recordings and electronic sounds. After hearing the tapes, Ono insisted that they make their own recording, Cynthia returned home unexpectedly the next day to find them sitting cross-legged on the floor in matching white robes, staring into each others eyes. The Unfinished Music series was an attempt by the pair to keep a record of their life together, with Onos Grapefruit in mind, they had imagined that the sound was not etched into the vinyls grooves but was meant to be created by the listeners mind. Lennon described Unfinished Music as saying whatever you want it to say and it is just us expressing ourselves like a child does, you know, however he feels like then. What were saying is make your own music, both of them had experience in avant-garde music, Ono had staged various multimedia events in New York during the early 1960s, and Lennon had worked on audio experimentation in the Beatles. Lennons longtime friend Peter Shotton recalled later in his memoir that many of the heard on the album were made by John. Lennon recorded directly to two-track stereophonic, but much of the material was monophonic. The song Together, written by George Buddy DeSylva, Lew Brown, shortly after the release of the Two Virgins, John stated in an interview that he believed the album can change people, as others have changed my head, just with their records. He then claimed thats what Yoko and my singing is, to change it like that. Lennon talked about making the album and Onos influence on him, in an interview in 1980 with Playboys David Sheff, Well, after Yoko and I met, I was still thinking it was an artistic collaboration, as it were – producer and artist, right. And Yoko came to visit me, instead of making love, we went upstairs and made tapes. I had this room full of different tapes where I would write and make strange loops, so we made a tape all night
