The Beatles In America 1964: The Beatles Book Series

By Jason Richards

A Fun and Fascinating Look at When The Beatles Came to America. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!

 

"I think one of the cheekiest things we ever did was to say to Brian Epstein, 'We're not going to America until we've got a Number One record.'" – Paul McCartney

 

On February 7, 1964, Pan Am Yankee Clipper flight 101 from London landed at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City—and The Beatles had arrived in America. Just six days earlier, 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' had become the Number 1 song in the country, having already sold more than a million copies nationwide.

 

Two days later a record-breaking 73 million Americans tuned in to watch The Beatles perform on The Ed Sullivan Show. The Fab Four would follow that up by electrifying a crowd in Washington, DC with their first concert in the United States. Beatlemania truly had arrived, and it would only get bigger.

 

In August 1964, The Beatles would make a triumphant return for their first North American concert tour. In just 33 days, The Beatles would sell an unprecedented number of tickets, earn more than any musical performers had before them, and establish their place in music history.

 

THE BEATLES In America 1964 is a magical mystery tour filled with fascinating stories, first-hand accounts, and in-depth coverage of John, Paul, George, and Ringo throughout their 1964 visits to America.

 

Take a step back through the mists of time and experience The Beatles in America like you never have before.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wheelhouse Publishers LLC
• Release date: Jan 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9781393054535

Book preview

Jason Richards

THE BEATLES In America 1964

First published by Wheelhouse Publishers, LLC 2021

Copyright © 2021 by Jason Richards

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

Jason Richards asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Jason Richards has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book and on its cover are trade names, service marks, trademarks and registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publishers and the book are not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. None of the companies referenced within the book have endorsed the book.

Cover image edited from original photo titled The Beatles in America.

Cover photo credit: United Press International, photographer unknown.

The Beatles in America, marked as public domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Beatles_in_America.JPG.

Cover design by Wheelhouse Publishers.

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To Beatles fans here, there, and everywhere.

And for John, Paul, George, and Ringo.

Contents

Preface

1. The Beatles Are Coming!

2. The Beatles Arrive in America

3. The Ed Sullivan Show

4. Plaza Hotel, New York

5. Washington, D.C.

6. Carnegie Hall

7. Miami, FL

8. North American Concert Tour

9. San Francisco, CA

10. Las Vegas, NV

11. Seattle, WA

12. Vancouver, Canada

13. Los Angeles, CA

14. Denver, CO

15. Cincinnati, OH

16. New York, NY (Forest Hills)

17. Atlantic City, NJ

18. Philadelphia, PA

19. Indianapolis, IN

20. Milwaukee, WI

21. Chicago, IL

22. Detroit, MI

23. Toronto, Canada

24. Montreal, Quebec, Canada

25. Key West and Jacksonville, FL

26. Boston, MA

27. Baltimore, MD

28. Pittsburgh, PA

29. Cleveland, OH

30. New Orleans, LA

31. Kansas City, MO

32. Dallas, TX

33. Ozark Mountains Ranch

34. New York, NY (Paramount Theatre)

35. Beatlemania in America 1964

The Beatles Book Series Newsletter

The Beatles in America 1965-1966

About the Author

Bibliography

Notes

Preface

I was born two weeks after The Beatles broke up, yet I can never remember a time when I was not a fan of their music. One of my fondest memories is of attending a Paul McCartney concert the summer of 1990. There he was: a former Beatle! One of the Fab Four performing Beatles’ songs live in concert. While it wasn’t quite Beatlemania, it sure was a rush.

I have written this book as a fan of The Beatles. I wanted to explore The Beatles in America, from their historical appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show through their first North American concert tour. I also look back at the important, and fascinating, events which influenced Beatlemania in America during 1964.

From news reporting, first-hand accounts, and John, Paul, George, and Ringo in their own words, I invite you to take a trip back to the start of the British music invasion of America with The Beatles in 1964. While I have sought to be thorough, I have not covered every single detail or aspect of The Beatles’ time in America throughout 1964. Transcripts from press conferences and radio and television interviews are from videos widely available on YouTube, so I have not provided specific references for them.

I have done my best to provide accurate details. Where there were discrepancies between sources, I did my best to provide the most accurate information. Any errors are not intentional. Should you notice any errors, please let me know with sourced material and I can correct errors in future editions.

What I hope to have achieved is a book which offers an informative and fun look at an important time in Beatles history. This book has been a lot of fun to write, I hope you will find it equally fun to read.

1

The Beatles Are Coming!

I think one of the cheekiest things we ever did was to say to Brian Epstein, ‘We’re not going to America until we’ve got a Number One record.’ – Paul McCartney¹

By 1964, the Beatles were ready to conquer America. They were experiencing astonishing success in England, having achieved three Number One singles and two Number One albums on the U.K. charts. Yet, despite their success at home, The Beatles were still unknown in the United States during the fall of 1963.

As ‘Love Me Do’ made the U.K. music charts in 1962 (eventually reaching No. 17), Parlophone, The Beatles’ record label, offered the song to Los Angeles based Capitol Records. Both Parlophone and Capitol were subsidiaries of EMI Records, so Capitol had the right of first refusal for the release of Beatles material in the United States. Upon hearing the song, Capitol A&R executive Dave Dexter passed on releasing it. Dexter recalled his decision in a 1988 interview:

I got one Beatles record […] and it was in with about seventeen other sample records. And, of course, the British companies they wanted us to issue as many of their records over here [the United States] as possible, because it was the biggest record market in the world. And I can only remember when I heard Lennon playing a harmonica on this record, I thought it was the worst thing I’d ever heard. So, I nixed it. I didn’t want any part of the Beatles.²

While Dexter would become infamous to Beatles fans for rejecting

The Beatles on more than one occasion, his decision to pass on ‘Love Me Do’ at the time was not surprising. Dexter’s rejection was in keeping with both his general attitude toward rock ‘n’ roll music and British musical acts. In fact, no British musical act had found sustained success in the United States. Even The Beatles did not seem all that bothered about Capitol passing on the single, as they had yet to achieve success beyond Liverpool at that point. However, things got far more interesting as The Beatles found greater success on the U.K. charts, and Beatlemania swept across England.

‘Please Please Me’ (single) was released in England on January 11, 1963. By the end of February, the song was Number 2 on the U.K. charts. It would spend 18 weeks in the Top 100, with 8 weeks in the Top 10, 11 weeks in the Top 20, and 15 weeks in the Top 40. The Beatles had a hit record.

As with ‘Love Me Do,’ Parlophone sent ‘Please Please Me’ to Capitol Records. Once again, Dave Dexter passed on releasing The Beatles in the United States. Perhaps it was the harmonica again. Whatever the reason, Beatles manager Brian Epstein and producer George Martin were not happy. They believed ‘Please Please Me’ could do well in America and pressured EMI (who owned Parlophone) to get the song released in the United States.

New York EMI entity Transglobal Music handled licensing of American music for EMI global distribution, and U.S. licensing for EMI musical artists when Capitol Records turned down artists for U.S. release. EMI transferred the U.S. rights to license The Beatles music to Transglobal with instructions to get ‘Please Please Me’ released. Other major labels, including Atlantic Records, were not interested. Again, British musical acts had yet to prove they could be successful in the U.S. marketplace. In fact, it would be The Beatles’ success in 1964 that would begin the British Invasion.

With no major U.S. record label interested in The Beatles, Transglobal’s attorney, Paul Marshall, offered the song to Vee-Jay Records, an independent label in Chicago mostly known for R&B and Gospel. In the early 1960s, Vee-Jay was punching above its weight with hits such as Gene Chandler’s ‘The Duke of Earl,’ and the Four Seasons’ ‘Sherry’ and ‘Big Girls Don’t Cry.’ Perhaps most important, regarding EMI and The Beatles, Marshall had placed EMI artist Frank Ifield’s Number 1 U.K. song ‘I Remember You’ with Vee-Jay for U.S. release (after Capitol rejected Ifield). ‘I Remember You’ reached Number 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. Because of Ifield’s success, Vee-Jay was willing to take a chance on The Beatles.

On January 10, 1963, Transglobal granted Vee-Jay Records right of first refusal to manufacture and sell Beatles recordings in the United States under certain conditions for five years. The first songs licensed were ‘Please Please Me’ and ‘Ask Me Why.’ On February 7, 1963, exactly one year before The Beatles would arrive in America for the first time, Vee-Jay released ‘Please Please Me,’ with ‘Ask Me Why’ on the B-side. The initial release was rushed, and early pressings of the record even had a misspelling of the band’s credit as the BEATTLES on side A of the 45 RPM. Despite ‘Please Please Me’ being a hit in England, the song did not sell well and never reached the U.S. music charts.

Vee-Jay then released ‘From Me To You,’ with ‘Thank You Girl’ on the B-side of the 45 record, on May 6, 1963, hoping to replicate the song’s U.K. chart-topping success. While ‘From Me To You’ spent 7 weeks at Number 1, and 21 total weeks on the U.K. charts, it sold just 21,126 copies and climbed only as far as 116 on the Billboard chart in the United States. While well short of its success in England, the single did far better than The Beatles’ U.S. debut ‘Please Please Me.’ Many speculate ‘From Me To You’ may have reached the Billboard Hot 100 had Del Shannon’s cover of the song had not been released in June 1963. After having a Number 1 hit with Runaway, Del Shannon’s cover of ‘From Me To You’ received more radio airplay, helping it to reach Number 77 on the Billboard Hot 100.

In the spring of 1963, Vee-Jay received the tapes for the Please Please Me LP. Vee-Jay dropped the previously released songs ‘Please Please Me’ and ‘Ask Me Why’ to get the album from fourteen to the U.S. standard twelve tracks. Having dropped the title song from the LP, Vee-Jay changed the name of the album to Introducing…the Beatles and scheduled a July 1963 release.

Plans to release Introducing…the Beatles were put on hold when Vee-Jay faced a financial crisis, and began one of the most fascinating, albeit rather confusing, periods of The Beatles music history in America. Vee-Jay’s president, Ewart Abner, had been taking money from the company accounts to pay personal gambling debts, and this left Vee-Jay short on cash. By late 1963, Vee-Jay would face a series of lawsuits, including from The Four Seasons, for failure to pay royalties. On August 8, 1963, after Transglobal stated Vee-Jay failed to make statements of sales and failed to pay royalties for Frank Ifield and The Beatles, Transglobal sent Vee-Jay a Western Union telegram:

REQUIRE YOU IMMEDIATELY CEASE MANUFACTURE AND DISTRIBUTION OF ANY AND ALL RECORDINGS CONTAINING PERFORMANCES OF FRANK IFIELD OR THE BEATTLES STOP PLEASE CONFIRM THAT ALL MANUFACTURE HAS STOPPED AND ALL MASTERS AND PRESSINGS RECALLED AND DESTROYED.³

It is interesting to note the Western Union telegram includes the same misspelling of BEATTLES as the first Vee-Jay pressings of ‘Please Please Me.’ Yet another misspelling was hardly the issue. Vee-Jay was in turmoil and EMI was left without a U.S. distributor for The Beatles, just as the Please Please Me LP was in its 14th week at the top of the U.K. album charts. Additionally, the single ‘She Loves You’ was set for U.K. release on August 23, 1963, with hopes for a U.S. release shortly thereafter.

There would later be legal questions surrounding Vee-Jay’s rights to distribute The Beatles in early 1964, but as far as Transglobal was concerned, right of first refusal to Beatles recordings in the United States reverted to Capitol Records. Capitol was approached to see if they were interested in releasing ‘She Loves You’ in the United States. Dave Dexter, again, passed on The Beatles.

Transglobal then signed a deal with Swan Records, a small Philadelphia independent label, for the U.S. release of ‘She Loves You’ and the B-side ‘I’ll Get You.’ But after the debacle with Vee-Jay Records, Transglobal was unwilling to extend licensing beyond the two songs and did not offer right of first refusal to Swan for future Beatles recordings. Swan released ‘She Loves You’ in the United States on September 16, 1963. Two days later, the song went to Number 1 in the U.K., spending six weeks in the top position and a total of 33 weeks on the U.K. charts.

The reaction to ‘She Loves You,’ at least initially, in the United States was far different. Swan only sold about 1,000 copies and, despite getting positive reviews in Billboard magazine, the song received little radio airplay or attention from listeners. Famed New York disc jockey Murray The K recalls playing ‘She Loves You’ on WINS radio:

They brought a record to me, and mentioned the possibility that The Beatles might come to the U.S. I said, ‘Okay, I heard a lot about it.’ I put it on the air. I had a record review board contest on WINS at the time where I’d play five new records each day. The audience would vote on which record they liked best, and the winners of each week would be played on Saturday. When I ran them in a contest with a record called, She Loves You it came in third out of the five records. But I still continued to play it for two or two-and-a-half weeks. Nothing happened. I mean, really no reaction. Nothing!⁴

Paul McCartney even recalled how The Beatles were not an instant success in the United States: ‘From Me To You’ was released—a flop in America. ‘She Loves You’—a big hit in England, big number one in England—a flop in the USA. Nothing until ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand.’⁵ After Beatlemania came to America, Swan Records would re-release ‘She Loves You.’ It would become a Number 1 hit for The Beatles in the United States and spend 15 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

The eventual change in fortunes for The Beatles in America were taking hold in England around the same time that the release of ‘She Loves You’ in the United States was flopping. On October 13, 1963, The Beatles performed on Val Parnell’s Sunday Night at the London Palladium, England’s equivalent to The Ed Sullivan Show, where 15 million people watched them perform ‘From Me To You,’ ‘I’ll Get You.’ ‘She Loves You,’ and ‘Twist And Shout.’ The crowd of screaming Beatles fans blocking Argyle Street outside the theater led to news reports of the hysteria, which the British press called Beatlemania.

Scottish promoter Andi Lothian claims to have coined the phrase to a reporter on October 7, 1963. It seems the first printed use of the word was on October 21, 1963 in a feature story, titled This Beatlemania, by Vincent Mulchrone, which appeared in London’s The Daily Mail newspaper. Regardless of the exact origin of the phrase, historians point to the Beatles’ October 13, 1963 appearance as the breakout moment for Beatlemania in England. And it would have a tremendous spillover effect in America.

Beatlemania arriving in America would result from converging events from the end of October 1963 to The Beatles themselves touching down at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York on February 7, 1964.

The first would be a chance encounter between Ed Sullivan and Beatles fans at London Airport on October 31, 1963. Ed Sullivan was passing through London Airport (as Heathrow International Airport was known at the time) for a flight to New York after a European visit, when he witnessed firsthand the pandemonium of Beatles fans. When he asked what all the commotion was about, he was told they were there to greet The Beatles returning to London from a concert tour of Sweden. Upon returning to New York, Sullivan had his staff inquire about The Beatles.

For their part, The Beatles were unaware of Sullivan being at the airport, or that the fans were there for them. They thought the crowd was waiting to see the Queen. It soon became clear to the four lads from Liverpool that the fans, wearing Beatles wigs, and screaming so loud they drowned out the plane engines, were there for them.

On November 4, 1963, The Beatles performed on the Royal Command Performance in London, where John Lennon made his famous remark: For our last number I’d like to ask your help. The people in the cheaper seats clap your hands. And the rest of you if you’d just rattle your jewelry. We’d like to sing a song called ‘Twist And Shout’.⁶ The Beatles had been the most anticipated act of the evening, and their performance was a tremendous success.

Peter Prichard, a London theatrical agent who also worked for Ed Sullivan as a European talent coordinator, told Sullivan about The Beatles’ appearance on the Royal Command Performance, and the hysteria surrounding them in England. Ed Sullivan remembered what he had witnessed a week earlier in London Airport. Prichard also reached out to Brian Epstein and told him he should try to get The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show.

Epstein already had a scheduled business trip to New York for promoting one of his other acts and to understand why The Beatles were not catching on in the United States, and what he could do to promote them in America. Arrangements were made for Brian Epstein to meet with Ed Sullivan on November 11, 1963.

The two men met on both November 11th and again on November 12th to complete the deal. Also in attendance at the second meeting was Ed Sullivan producer Bob Precht. They agreed for The Beatles to appear on the Ed Sullivan Show live on February 9, 1964, from the Ed Sullivan television studio in New York City, and again live on the show from a Miami hotel on February 16, 1964. The group would receive $3,500 (the equivalent of $29,571 in 2020) for each performance, plus travel, lodging, and top billing. Precht suggested taping a third performance to air on February 23, 1964. Epstein agreed to have The Beatles tape the performance following their live broadcast on February 9th. They would receive $3,000 (equal to $25,346 in 2020) for the taped performance, bringing their total for all three shows to $10,000 ($84,490 in 2020).

With the Beatles scheduled to appear three times on The Ed Sullivan Show, EMI sends a copy of ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ to Capitol Records. Despite the single having more than a million advanced orders in the U.K., assuring an instant hit, and The Beatles scheduled performances on The Ed Sullivan Show, Dave Dexter rejects ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand.’ This is now the fourth time Dexter has had Capitol Records pass on releasing The Beatles in the United States. Dexter would later claim he accepted ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ after an A&R man played it for him on a trip to England,⁷ but other accounts tell it differently.

The accepted story is that Brian Epstein placed a call directly to Capitol president Alan Livingston in November 1963. Livingston himself recounted the story in interviews over the years.

I’m sitting in my office one day and I got a call from London from a man named Brian Epstein, who I didn’t know. I took the call. And he said, ‘I am the personal manager of the Beatles and I don’t understand why you won’t release them.’ And I said, ‘Well, frankly, Mr. Epstein, I haven’t heard them.’ And he said, Would you please listen and call me back.’ And I said, ‘OK,’ and I called Dexter and said, ‘Let me have some Beatles records.’ He sent up a few, and I listened. I liked them. I thought