“Who are these insects, the Beetles?”

April 9, 2023 7:15 AM

The Beatles at Stowe School is a 27 minute BBC radio feature by Samira Ahmed about a 1963 concert played by a just-about-to-be-huge Fab Four at an upper class all-boys boarding school in England. While reporting the story, Ahmed found out that one of the pupils, John Bloomfield, had taped the whole thing on an old open reel recorder, the oldest recording of a full performance by the band in the UK. Ahmed gives the backstory behind the feature on her personal blog.
posted by Kattullus (13 comments total)

Here's an edit of just the music. It's only about 80 seconds of music, the larger story is more interesting.

See also: 17-Year-Old LL Cool J Plays a Maine Gymnasium in 1985.
posted by Nelson at 7:54 AM on April 9, 2023 [5 favorites]

I know a graduate of Stowe, but this was a few years before his time.

Photo from the concert shows a peculiar, antennaed "B" of a logo on Ringo's bass drum.
posted by Rash at 8:18 AM on April 9, 2023 [5 favorites]

That tracks, Rash, as Ringo bought new drums later that same month, which is where the drop-T Beatles logo comes from.
posted by Kattullus at 8:25 AM on April 9, 2023 [3 favorites]

Rodger Hodgson of Supertramp was at Stowe school at the same time and would have been 13.
posted by Lanark at 8:32 AM on April 9, 2023 [13 favorites]

Yesterday I came across an early video of The Beatles that is really good. It seems that the audience was a bit quieter, a lot less jumping up and down. In comments ppl speculate that the band can hear themselves thus a tighter show. It's about half hour long.

They really were fantastic. They were happy as hell, they were such pretty kids; they were The Beatles, they were "the toppermost of the poppermost."

You Can't Do That 0:08
All My Loving 2:45
She Loves You 4:49
Can't Buy Me Love 7:12
Twist And Shout 9:23
Long Tall Sally 12:02
Till There Was You 14:42
Roll Over Beethoven 16:54
This Boy 19:13
I Saw Her Standing There 21:33
posted by dancestoblue at 8:36 AM on April 9, 2023 [9 favorites]

Key quotes:

We had no idea what was going to happen.

(shown a photograph of themselves in the audience)
I was having a WTF moment.

I mean, I went to a boarding school. If they hired a band then that band was lame. They wouldn't hire a band that wasn't lame. I bet these kids felt the same - surprise! Just so happens to be the nascent GOAT. And from that moment they're all switched onto rock'n'roll.

What a great story.
posted by adept256 at 2:06 PM on April 9, 2023 [2 favorites]

An incredible moment, to be sure. On the cusp of immortal fame, but also as representing their downshift from raucous and lewd crowds into respectability. To their credit, they never quite managed it.
posted by Capt. Renault at 3:33 PM on April 9, 2023 [2 favorites]

That tracks, Rash, as Ringo bought new drums later that same month,

I took his old Premier drum kit from him and brought it back to the store. We renovated it in our workshop, and then sold it.

I like that some rando wound up with a second-hand drum kit from... a pretty successful band from Liverpool who would in a year be maybe the most famous group on Earth. I wonder if the subsequent owner knew the kit’s provenance.

Of course, I know a mildly shady music store near me that was slightly famous as the store that supplied rental gear to a local up-and-coming band that had a big hit... the store was also slightly infamous as the slightly shady store that moved several dozen instruments as, “seriously, this is the actual guitar that you can hear on the band’s hit.”
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:45 PM on April 9, 2023 [2 favorites]

I've been to the music shop where John nicked the harmonica that can be heard on Love Me Do. It's in Arnhem, the Netherlands; they were on their way to Hamburg at the time. The shop no longer exists but here is a picture of a younger version of me, releasing a BookCrossing book there, when it was still there. Yes, it was a book about the Beatles.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:03 PM on April 9, 2023 [9 favorites]

For decades now I've heard here/there that Delbert McClinton "taught John Lennon how to play harmonica" and only now, today, just now, have I chased it down. Lots of references to the story in a simple search, and here is McClinton on the story:
~~~ Compass: Did you teach John Lennon to play the blues harmonica?

~~~ D.M.: Well, I gave him a few tips in 1962 … this was a long time ago. We were all going to change the world then … You have to put it in perspective. We were all young and full of dreams and hope. I was touring with Bruce Channel with our world-wide hit, "Hey Baby." When we played in England, the Beatles were an opening act for a couple of shows. John wanted me to give him some tips. I spent every bit of eight hours with him, over a few days. Now it's chiseled in stone. It's been romanticized. I didn't really teach him, but gave him tips. I showed him what I did. When to suck and when to blow. Nothing really more than that. Although it was a moment in time.

So now, maybe 40 years or 50 after hearing about it and wondering if it's true, I can finally set it down. Would that all of my questions could be so easily answered. Perhaps more accurately, would that I would take the few minutes to chase down answers to questions I carry with me.
posted by dancestoblue at 5:04 PM on April 9, 2023 [3 favorites]

“I know a graduate of Stowe”

Holy creeping Americanisms, Bat Man. Surely you mean an ‘old boy’.
posted by Quinbus Flestrin at 5:42 PM on April 9, 2023 [4 favorites]

The term they use in the interviews is “Old Stoic” which I find beyond parody.
posted by Kattullus at 12:28 AM on April 10, 2023 [2 favorites]

Ah. Everything is illuminated.
I had no idea why the phrase 'Old Stoic' was in there.
posted by MtDewd at 5:54 AM on April 10, 2023 [1 favorite]