The Beatles are very much alive as part of Liverpool's heritage. It is impossible to move round the city without seeing reminders of the greatness of these four Liverpool lads.
They seem to be everywhere in posters, artwork, paintings, sculptures. You would have to be blind not to see the influence that they had on this great city. Virtually every museum has a section dedicated to them in one way or another.
On our present visit I have taken the Magical Mystery Tour for the second time in three years but also have gone inside the houses of John Lennon and Paul McCartney - two very contrasting people. McCartney - the jewel of Liverpool who still has a house in the area and makes regular returns and annually presents the prizes at the LIPA (Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts) graduation ceremony and Lennon - the troubled soul cut off in his prime but whose legend has grown since his murder in 1980.
So two very different feelings in the houses. We went on the National Trust tour which is the only way to get inside them. Started at Mendips which was the boyhood home of Lennon where he lived with his Aunt Mary (whom he always called Mimi) and Uncle George. This is a place that I have read about so many times and which was featured extensively in the excellent film Nowhere Boy. It was a strange experience to stand in the man's bedroom and try to recall the ghosts of those far off days that are getting ever further back into rock music history.
To walk in the footsteps of Lennon, McCartney, Starr et al was a sobering moment. To look at the garden where Mimi, John's mother Julia and her student lodgers would have sat in deckchairs enjoying afternoon tea was an amazing experience that somehow overshadowed the McCartney home. Ironically Lennon lived a middle class existence whereas the other three Beatles had firmly entrenched working class roots. Yet it was always Lennon who portrayed the ideals of the "Working Class Hero." McCartney's home has been restored to what it was as he grew up, although the furniture is of the time and not of the house - in other words replacements for the originals which I believe were thrown out when his father Jim moved out of the property. Slightly disappointing that the piano was one like Paul used to play and not the one he actually played.
If you visit Liverpool you just have to immerse yourself in Merseybeat and the sounds of the past despite the fact that we are now half a century further on.
They seem to be everywhere in posters, artwork, paintings, sculptures. You would have to be blind not to see the influence that they had on this great city. Virtually every museum has a section dedicated to them in one way or another.
On our present visit I have taken the Magical Mystery Tour for the second time in three years but also have gone inside the houses of John Lennon and Paul McCartney - two very contrasting people. McCartney - the jewel of Liverpool who still has a house in the area and makes regular returns and annually presents the prizes at the LIPA (Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts) graduation ceremony and Lennon - the troubled soul cut off in his prime but whose legend has grown since his murder in 1980.
So two very different feelings in the houses. We went on the National Trust tour which is the only way to get inside them. Started at Mendips which was the boyhood home of Lennon where he lived with his Aunt Mary (whom he always called Mimi) and Uncle George. This is a place that I have read about so many times and which was featured extensively in the excellent film Nowhere Boy. It was a strange experience to stand in the man's bedroom and try to recall the ghosts of those far off days that are getting ever further back into rock music history.
To walk in the footsteps of Lennon, McCartney, Starr et al was a sobering moment. To look at the garden where Mimi, John's mother Julia and her student lodgers would have sat in deckchairs enjoying afternoon tea was an amazing experience that somehow overshadowed the McCartney home. Ironically Lennon lived a middle class existence whereas the other three Beatles had firmly entrenched working class roots. Yet it was always Lennon who portrayed the ideals of the "Working Class Hero." McCartney's home has been restored to what it was as he grew up, although the furniture is of the time and not of the house - in other words replacements for the originals which I believe were thrown out when his father Jim moved out of the property. Slightly disappointing that the piano was one like Paul used to play and not the one he actually played.
If you visit Liverpool you just have to immerse yourself in Merseybeat and the sounds of the past despite the fact that we are now half a century further on.
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