![\"beattle-vs1\"](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/beattle-vs1.jpg\")
THE BEATLES<\/b><\/h1>\nTHE BEATLES<\/b><\/h1>\nI\u2019m kind of avoiding Beatles 50th anniversary hoopla.<\/p>\n
Big-name commemorative concerts starring multi-genre artists who were born a generation or three later, or even those featuring Beatles contemporaries, I don\u2019t really need to see, so I\u2019ll probably pass on Sunday\u2019s Grammy celebration on CBS. I didn\u2019t watch the CNN special or any of the Letterman tributes. There\u2019s a Beatles fan fest here in New York that I\u2019ll probably skip as well.<\/p>\n
I did go to a press preview of the Ladies and Gentlemen\u2026The Beatles!<\/i> multimedia exhibition celebrating the Fab Four’s arrival in New York 50 years ago this week. It opened yesterday at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and runs through May 10.<\/p>\n
One of the speakers, who had actually been to a Beatles U.S. concert, prefaced her remarks by noting the Beatles\u2019 haircuts and suits, and how they \u201cseduced\u201d America. Another said how he watched them on Ed Sullivan and went out and got a guitar the next day.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt changed my life,\u201d he said, \u201cand American culture.\u201d<\/p>\n
Obvious and predictable, for sure, but I can\u2019t really add to it. I mean, I remember exactly the first time I heard The Beatles, yeah yeah yeah, like it was yesterday. How joyously startled and stunned I was the first time I heard \u201cI Want to Hold Your Hand.\u201d Yet to this day I can\u2019t really explain why.<\/span><\/p>\n But I know someone who can. Beefy!<\/span><\/p>\n You may recall that it was Beefy who explained to me the significance of Ronnie Wood\u2019s two bass players\u2014one electric, one upright acoustic\u2014who were in the band he brought, along with Mick Taylor, to the Cutting Room a couple months ago. You may also remember that Beefy\u2019s real name is Robert Kenison, though fans far and wide know him as the great Troy Charmel, guitarist\/pianist of the legendary Dr. Bop & the Headliners, the celebrated Midwest rock \u2019n\u2019 roll show band of the 1970s that famously featured vocalist Al Craven, the White Raven.<\/span><\/p>\n But I first saw Beefy in the mid-\u201960s, when Beefy, then 18, played in a Beatles\/British Invasion-inspired band called The Gentlemen\u2014which played at a Van Hise Junior High School dance in Madison, Wis.\u2014wearing Beatles suits like they have at the <\/span>Ladies and Gentlemen<\/i> exhibition, of course.<\/span><\/p>\n If anyone could explain how\u2014and why\u2014I felt so overwhelmed that first time I heard \u201cI Want to Hold Your Hand\u201d 50 years ago, it would be Beefy!<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI can\u2019t put my finger on it, either!\u201d Beefy said, when I called him an hour after leaving the exhibit. I implored him to give it a try anyway.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cTheir voices were so <\/span>upfront<\/i>,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Everly Brothers sang in <\/span>thirds<\/i>, one third above each other. It\u2019s a harmony thing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Beefy knows I have no idea what he\u2019s talking about when he starts talking music theory, but he continued.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe Beatles did that a lot of course, but they also did what they call <\/span>fifths<\/i> between their voices: One sings a note, and another is a few notes above\u2014not just a third. In music, it\u2019s called a \u2018fifth.\u2019 It\u2019s very <\/span>powerful<\/i>, and sounds like a bagpipes\u2019 drone sometimes. Very different.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019m sure he was making sense.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe tricky thing is, they started playing on the <\/span>upbeat<\/i>,\u201d Beefy tried to explain, vocalizing the awesome \u201cDo-do-DO! Do-do-DO! Do-do-DO! Neenie-neenie-neenie\u2026\u201d power chord intro of \u201cI Want to Hold Your Hand.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThen the handclaps and voices come in, and it all seems <\/span>off-kilter<\/i>: You hear the beat, and think they\u2019re coming in on the <\/span>one<\/i>, but there\u2019s a delay before they come in! Right off the bat they\u2019re doing things like that that were <\/span>different<\/i>. Finding ways to tweak things a little bit. Unbeknownst to listeners, they were starting songs on the upbeat, so it sounded like they were coming in off the beat! And their voices come in and synch up on the \u2018Oh yeah, I\u2019ll.\u2019 The whole intro is odd, and you\u2019re going, \u2018What is this?\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Yes, Beefy. I\u2019ve been going \u2018What is this?\u2019 now for 50 years!<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cTheir voices are always really prevalent in those first songs. They sing very high, which is very difficult to sing for the average baritone male singer and yet not sound <\/span>thin<\/i> high\u2014not like <\/span>Michael Jackson<\/i> kind of high, but thicker and edgier with the English groups. It\u2019s almost a baritone sound, but they\u2019re singing in a tenor range so it doesn\u2019t sound thin\u2014and has a gruff edge to it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n And there are <\/span>three<\/i> voices.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s hard to tell the three of them, because they blended extremely well. Like on \u2018This Boy\u2019: McCartney and Lennon and Harrison. It\u2019s hard to tell who\u2019s who. Is Lennon on the bottom? Harrison? It\u2019s just a beautiful blend in the voices, and rhythmically, they were <\/span>beyond<\/i>: Lennon\u2019s rhythm guitar was phenomenal! The rapid-fire triplets he plays on \u2018All My Loving\u2019 is phenomenal. Or the way he plays background guitar on \u2018I Saw Her Standing There\u2019: When they played rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, he played these <\/span>driving<\/i> backgrounds.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Beefy pointed out that Lennon\u2019s Rickenbacker guitar was \u201cshorter, almost a three-quarter.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n What the hell?<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cPunch\u201d is the key word, eh, Beefy?<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThere was Lennon\u2019s midrange punch with the shorter-neck guitar. George\u2019s Country Gentleman was a more melodic instrument, so they had a different combination of instrumentation that was previously unheard in rock \u2019n\u2019 roll bands\u2014and then Ringo was way <\/span>beyond<\/i> in his sense of feel and time. The things he added were always a little different and right on and with a great feel. I don\u2019t think The Beatles would have been The Beatles without Ringo. He was as important as anything else.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Not to leave out George Martin.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThen there was George Martin and the way he recorded them. Early on he was trying to reproduce their live sound, and he really <\/span>did<\/i>. Put on \u2018I Want to Hold Your Hand\u2019 and it\u2019s <\/span>still<\/i> phenomenal! If there had been no Beatles and it came out today with all the harmonizers and synthesizers and electronic drums and over-produced <\/span>everything<\/i>, \u2018I Want to Hold Your Hand\u2019 would <\/span>still<\/i> dominate right away. It sounds live, and it\u2019s so overwhelming!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s no end to it,\u201d Beefy concluded. \u201cThe harmonies, intricate vocal arrangements, key changes, unusual chord progressions\u2014and the lyrics, and the fact that they wrote awesome songs. They did it all, and that\u2019s why they are who they are and will forever be\u2026The Beatles.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n And, I add, nothing that can be topped, let alone approached, by any of the artists on any of the tribute programs over the next week or two.<\/span><\/p>\n Jim Bessman<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" THE BEATLES From Beefy\u2019s Point of View I\u2019m kind of avoiding Beatles 50th anniversary hoopla. Big-name commemorative concerts starring multi-genre artists who were born a generation or three later, or even those featuring Beatles contemporaries, I don\u2019t really need to see, so I\u2019ll probably pass on Sunday\u2019s Grammy celebration on CBS. I didn\u2019t watch the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4976,1058],"tags":[3818],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11437"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11437"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11437\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11441,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11437\/revisions\/11441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"The](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/The-Beatles.png\")
\u201cIt\u2019s like in a string quartet where you have a viola and cello. They almost had that with McCartney\u2019s violin bass\u2014not a Fender or <\/span>deep<\/i> bass, but with a punchier sound that you could hear the notes better than with a standup string bass. You could really hear the bass lines with the Hofner that McCartney played\u2014and he was very inventive with it: That fast-paced bass riff on \u2018I Saw Her Standing There\u2019 was really clear and added to the punch.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n