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The Beatles were a pop and rock group from Liverpool, England. They are one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed bands in the history of popular music.

In the United Kingdom, The Beatles released more than 40 different singles, albums, and EPs that reached number one. This commercial success was repeated in many other countries; their record company, EMI, estimated that by 1985 they had sold over one billion records worldwide. The Beatles are the best-selling musical act of all time in the United States, according to the Recording Industry Association of America.

Greatest artists of all time
In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked The Beatles #1 on its list of 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. According to that same magazine, their innovative music and cultural impact helped define the 1960s and their influence on pop culture is still evident today.

The Beatles led the mid-1960s musical "British Invasion" into the United States. Although their initial musical style was rooted in 1950s rock and roll and homegrown skiffle, the group explored genres ranging from Tin Pan Alley to psychedelic rock. Their clothes, styles, and statements made them trend-setters, while their growing social awareness saw their influence extend into the social and cultural revolutions of the 1960s.

 Formation of the Beatles

In March 1957, while attending Quarry Bank Grammar School in Liverpool, John Lennon formed a skiffle group called The Quarrymen. Lennon and the Quarrymen met guitarist Paul McCartney at the Woolton Garden Fête held at St. Peter's Church on 6 July 1957 and added him to the group a few days later. On 6 February 1958, the young guitarist George Harrison was invited to watch the group (who played under a variety of names) at Wilson Hall, Garston, Liverpool. McCartney had become acquainted with Harrison on the morning school bus ride to the Liverpool Institute, as they both lived in Speke. At McCartney's insistence, Harrison joined the Quarrymen as lead guitarist, after a rehearsal in March 1958, overcoming Lennon's initial reluctance because of Harrison's young age.  Lennon and McCartney both played rhythm guitar during that period, and had a high turnover of drummers. The Quarrymen went through a progression of names — "Johnny and the Moondogs" and "Long John and the Beatles". Lennon's art school friend Stuart Sutcliffe joined on bass in January 1960, when they were called "The Silver Beetles" (derived from Larry Parnes' suggestion of "Long John and the Silver Beetles") — before settling on "The Beatles" in August 1960. Sutcliffe suggested 'The Beetles' as a tribute to Buddy Holly and The Crickets, which he and Lennon then thought of changing to 'The Beatals'. They changed their name again to the 'Silver Beats', The Silver Beetles, and the 'Silver Beatles', but Lennon shortened it to The Beatles, to avoid being introduced as "Long John Silver of the Silver Beatles", which was too similar to 'Johnny and the Moondogs'. After a tour with Johnny Gentle in Scotland, they changed their name to the 'Beatles'. Cynthia Lennon suggests that Lennon came up with the name Beatles at a "brainstorming session over a beer-soaked table in the Renshaw Hall bar." Lennon, who was well known for giving multiple versions of the same story, joked in a 1961 Mersey Beat magazine article that "It came in a vision — a man appeared on a flaming pie and said unto them, 'From this day on you are Beatles with an A'". During an interview in 2001, Paul McCartney took credit for the peculiar spelling of the name, saying that "John had the idea of calling us the Beetles, I said, 'how about the Beatles; you know, like the beat of the drum?' At the time, everyone was stoned enough to find it hilarious. It's funny how history is made."

The Beatles
In May 1960, the Silver Beetles toured northeast Scotland as a back-up band with singer Johnny Gentle. They met Gentle an hour before their first gig, and McCartney referred to the tour as a great experience for the band.

For the tour the often drummerless group secured the services of Tommy Moore, who was considerably older than the others. Moore left the band soon after the tour and went back to work in a bottling factory as a forklift truck driver. Norman Chapman was the band's next drummer, but was called up for National Service a few weeks later. His departure posed a serious problem as the group's unofficial manager, Allan Williams, had arranged for them to perform in clubs on the Reeperbahn in Hamburg, Germany.

Elvis

John Lennon said: "It was Elvis who really got me buying records. I thought that early stuff of his was great. The Bill Haley era passed me by, in a way. When his records came on the wireless, my mother used to hear them, but they didn’t do anything for me. It was Elvis who got me hooked on beat music. When I heard 'Heartbreak Hotel', I thought ‘this is it’ and I started to grow sideboards and all that gear...." He also commented: "Nothing really affected me until I heard Elvis. If there hadn't been an Elvis, there wouldn't have been a Beatles."

Finding themselves drummerless before their upcoming engagement in Hamburg, on 12 August 1960 the group invited Pete Best to become their drummer. Best had played with The Blackjacks in The Casbah Coffee Club, owned by Pete's mother, Mona Best. This was a cellar club in West Derby, Liverpool, where The Beatles played and often visited. In the documentary The Compleat Beatles, Williams said that Best "played not too cleverly, but passable".

Four days after hiring Best, the group left for Hamburg. The Beatles began playing in Hamburg at the Indra Club and moved on 4 October 1960 to the Kaiserkeller. They were required to play six or seven hours a night, seven nights a week. On 21 November 1960, Harrison was deported for having lied to the German authorities about his age. A week later, having started a small fire at their living quarters while vacating it for more luxurious rooms, McCartney and Best were arrested, charged with arson, and deported. Lennon followed the others to Liverpool in mid-December while Sutcliffe stayed behind in Hamburg with his new German fiancée Astrid Kirchherr. The reunited group played an engagement on 17 December 1960 at the Casbah Club (with Chas Newby substituting for Sutcliffe).
The Indra Club, where the Beatles first played on arriving in Hamburg, as it appears today. The Indra Club, where the Beatles first played on arriving in Hamburg, as it appears today.

Return to Hamburg
The Beatles returned to Hamburg in April 1961, performing at the "Top Ten Club". While playing at the Top Ten Club they were recruited by singer Tony Sheridan to act as his backing band on a series of recordings for the German Polydor Records label, produced by famed bandleader Bert Kaempfert.

Kaempfert signed the group to its own Polydor contract at the first session on 22 June 1961. On 31 October Polydor released the recording "My Bonnie (Mein Herz ist bei dir nur)", which appeared on the German charts under the name "Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers", a generic name used for whoever happened to be in Sheridan's backup band. In addition to the legend that this record led to the group's eventual meeting with Brian Epstein, it also resulted in their first mention in the American press.

Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers
Around the beginning of 1962, Cashbox mentioned "My Bonnie" as the debut of a "new rock and roll team, Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers". A few copies were also pressed under the Decca label for U.S. disc jockeys, as American Decca had a distribution deal with Polydor parent Deutsche Grammophon. When the group returned to Liverpool, Sutcliffe stayed on in Hamburg with Kirchherr. By then McCartney had taken over bass duties.

In a meeting with the group at NEMS on 10 December 1961, Epstein proposed the idea of managing the group. The Beatles signed a five-year contract with Epstein on 24 January 1962. Epstein led The Beatles' quest for a British recording contract. Epstein had been manager of the record department at North End Music Store (NEMS), an offshoot of his family's furniture store. He played on the status of NEMS as a major record dealer to gain access to producers and recording company executives. In a now-famous exchange, Decca Records A&R executive Dick Rowe turned Epstein down flat, informing him that "Guitar groups are on the way out, Mr. Epstein." (See The Decca audition.) While Epstein was negotiating with Decca, he also approached EMI marketing executive Ron White. White (who was not himself a record producer) in turn contacted EMI producers Norrie Paramor, Walter Ridley, and Norman Newell, all of whom declined to record The Beatles. White did not approach EMI's fourth staff producer—George Martin—who was on holiday at the time.

Their third stay in Hamburg was from 13 April to 31 May 1962, when they opened The Star Club. Upon their arrival, they were informed of Sutcliffe's death from a brain haemorrhage.

Decca and EMI
After failing to impress Decca Records, Epstein went to the HMV store on Oxford Street in London to transfer the Decca tapes to discs. There, recording engineer Jim Foy referred him to Sid Coleman, who ran EMI's publishing arm. When Coleman heard the demo tapes he suggested taking the tapes to George Martin, who, Coleman explained, "does comedy records" and headed the Parlophone label at EMI.

Epstein eventually met with Martin, who signed the group to EMI on a one-year renewable contract and scheduled their first recording session on 6 June 1962 at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in north London. Martin had not been particularly impressed by the band's demo recordings, but he instantly liked them as people when he met them. He concluded that they had raw musical talent, but said (in later interviews) that what made the difference for him was their wit and humour.

Martin did have a problem with Pete Best, whom he criticised for not being able to keep time. He privately suggested to Epstein that the band use another drummer in the studio. There was speculation by some that Best's popularity with fans was another source of friction. In addition, Epstein had become exasperated with his refusal to adopt the distinctive hairstyle as part of their unified look. Best also had missed a number of engagements because of illness. The three founding members enlisted Epstein to dismiss Best, which he did on 16 August 1962. They asked Ringo Starr (born Richard Starkey), the drummer for one of the top Merseybeat groups, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, to join the band; Starr had performed occasionally with The Beatles in Hamburg. The first recordings of Lennon, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr together were made as early as 15 October 1960, in a series of demonstration records privately recorded in Hamburg while acting as the backing group for singer Lu Walters. Starr played on The Beatles' second EMI recording session on 4 September 1962, but Martin hired session drummer Andy White for their next session on 11 September.

One penny
Their recording contract paid them one penny for each single sold, which was split amongst the four Beatles — one farthing per group member. This royalty rate was further reduced for singles sold outside the UK, on which they received half of one penny (again split between the whole band) per single. Martin said later that it was a "pretty awful" contract.

The Beatles' first EMI session on 6 June 1962 did not yield any recordings considered worthy of release, but the September sessions a few months later produced a minor UK hit, "Love Me Do", which peaked on the charts at number 17. ("Love Me Do" reached the top of the U.S. singles chart over 18 months later in May 1964.) On 26 November 1962, they recorded their second single "Please Please Me", which reached number two on the official UK charts and number one on the NME chart. Three months later, they recorded their first album (also titled Please Please Me). The band's first televised performance was on the People and Places programme, transmitted live from Manchester by Granada Television on 17 October 1962. As The Beatles' fame spread, the frenzied adulation of the group, predominantly from teenage female fans, was dubbed Beatlemania.

Submediant switches from C major into A flat major
The band also began to be noticed by serious music critics. On 23 December 1963, The Times music critic William Mann published an essay extolling The Beatles' compositions—their "fresh and euphonious" guitars in "Till There Was You", their "submediant switches from C major into A flat major", and the "octave ascent" in "I Want to Hold Your Hand", for example.

The Beatles themselves were perplexed by this analysis by Mann: "...one gets the impression that they think simultaneously of harmony and melody, so firmly are the major tonic sevenths and ninths built into their tunes, and the flat-submediant key-switches, so natural is the Aeolian cadence at the end of 'Not a Second Time' (the chord progression which ends Mahler's 'Song of the Earth')." In 1980, Lennon commented, "To this day I don't have any idea what [Aeolian cadences] are. They sound like exotic birds."

Early 1963
Although the band experienced huge popularity on the UK record charts in early 1963, EMI's American operation, Capitol Records, declined to issue the singles "Please Please Me" and "From Me to You" (their first official number one hit in the UK). Vee-Jay Records, a small Chicago label, issued the singles as part of a deal for the rights to another performer's masters.

Art Roberts, music director of popular Chicago radio station WLS, placed "Please Please Me" into radio rotation in late February 1963, arguably the first time a Beatles record was heard on American radio. Vee-Jay's rights to The Beatles were later cancelled for non-payment of royalties.

She loves you
In August 1963, Philadelphia-based Swan Records released "She Loves You", which also failed to receive airplay. A testing of the song on Dick Clark's TV show American Bandstand produced laughter from American teenagers when they saw the group's distinctive hairstyles.

In early November 1963, Brian Epstein persuaded Ed Sullivan to present The Beatles on three editions of his show in February, and parlayed this guaranteed exposure into a record deal with Capitol Records. Capitol committed to a mid-January release for "I Want to Hold Your Hand". On 10 December 1963, a 5-minute story shot in England about the phenomenon of Beatlemania was shown on the CBS Evening News. (The segment first aired on the CBS Morning News on 22 November and had originally been scheduled to be repeated on that day's Evening News, but regular programming was cancelled following the assassination of John F. Kennedy that day.) The segment inspired a teenage girl named Marsha Albert living in Silver Spring, Maryland to write to Carroll James, a disc jockey at Washington DC's WWDC radio station, requesting that he play records by The Beatles. Carroll James had seen the same news story and arranged through a friend to have a copy of The Beatles' new single "I Want to Hold Your Hand" sent over to him in Washington DC. Immediately after debuting the record on December 17, the station received overwhelming positive audience reaction and the station escalated airplay of the record. Made aware of the overwhelming listener response, Capitol Records president Alan Livingston decided a few days later to take advantage of the response and rush-release the already-prepared single three weeks ahead of schedule on 26 December 1963.
 

New York Radio Stations
Several New York radio stations—first WMCA, then WINS and WABC—began playing "I Want to Hold Your Hand" on its release day. The positive response to the record that had started in Washington was duplicated in New York and quickly spread to other markets.

The record sold one million copies in just ten days, and by 16 January 1964, Cashbox magazine had certified the record number one (in the edition datelined 23 January). Aware that the Ed Sullivan Show was scheduled to present The Beatles live in early February, the Jack Paar Show licensed a film clip of The Beatles performing "She Loves You" from Britain's BBC and aired the footage on 3 January 1964, enabling Paar to claim that he had beaten his rival Sullivan to showing The Beatles on a network TV show.

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