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Horst Fascher | |
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 Fascher in 2012 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | 5 February 1936 Hamburg, Germany |
| Occupation(s) | Manager, producer |
Horst Fascher (born 5 February 1936) is a German music business figure who was a friend and business associate of the Beatles during their early career playing in Hamburg, Germany.
Horst Fascher was born in Hamburg, Germany, on 5 February 1936. His mother was a cleaning lady and his father was a seaman who fought in World War II, subsequently being held as a prisoner of war by the Soviet Union until 1951. As a young man, Fascher was a promising amateur boxer, becoming flyweight champion of West Germany. He had been expected to represent his country at the 1960 Olympics, but after accidentally killing a sailor in a street fight he served six months in prison and was given a lifetime ban from boxing. After his release, Fascher became involved in the emerging rock and roll scene around Hamburg's Reeperbahn, working as a barman and bouncer in the music clubs and managing groups. [1] [2]
When the Beatles (including original drummer Pete Best and bassist Stuart Sutcliffe) made their first trip to Germany in August 1960, Fascher befriended the young group, who played at the Indra Club and the Kaiserkeller. As they rose through the ranks of bands playing the Reeperbahn (making five trips in all over the next two-and-a-half years), Fascher usually managed to be working at the same clubs, and for the same boss, as the Beatles. They visited him at home, and he in turn kept troublemakers away from the band. The only favour Fascher asked was to be able to sing with them occasionally onstage, which was granted; Eddie Cochran's music was a common choice.
The Beatles (with Best now replaced by Ringo Starr, and Paul McCartney changing to bass when Sutcliffe departed) did not want to make their last Hamburg visit, at the end of 1962, preferring to stay in England to promote their new single, "Love Me Do", but were persuaded by manager Brian Epstein, via Horst Fascher, who recalled later "I had to give him thirty marks under the table to make him do it." Nonetheless, the band had a holiday residency at the Star-Club (which Fascher co-ran), through the New Year.
Fascher guested with the Beatles during their New Year's Eve show, which was recorded by another Liverpool musician, Ted "Kingsize" Taylor. Years later (in 1977), the tape was released commercially as Live! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962 . A song from the album, "Hallelujah, I Love Her So", features Horst Fascher's vocals. Another song, "Be-Bop-A-Lula", features his brother Fred's vocals.
Fascher remained a friend and admirer of the band years after they became famous. Some of his stories about the band's Hamburg days (and his impressions of the young Beatles) have found their way into music biographies, including Philip Norman's Shout!. His own memoir "Let The Good Times Roll! Der Star-Club-Gründer erzählt" ("Told By The Star-Club Founder") was published in 2006.
Randolph Peter Best is an English musician who was the drummer for the Beatles from 1960 to 1962. He was dismissed shortly before the band achieved worldwide fame and is one of several people referred to as a fifth Beatle.
The Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960, comprising John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the development of 1960s counterculture and the recognition of popular music as an art form. Rooted in skiffle, beat and 1950s rock 'n' roll, their sound incorporated elements of classical music and traditional pop in innovative ways. The band also explored music styles ranging from folk and Indian music to psychedelia and hard rock. As pioneers in recording, songwriting and artistic presentation, the Beatles revolutionized many aspects of the music industry and were often publicized as leaders of the era's youth and sociocultural movements.
The fifth Beatle is an informal title that has been applied to people who were at one point a member of the Beatles or who had a strong association with John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. The "fifth Beatle" claims first appeared in the press immediately upon the band's rise to global fame in 1963–64. The members have offered their own views as to who should be described with the title: McCartney said on two occasions that "if anyone was the fifth Beatle", it was manager Brian Epstein and producer George Martin. Harrison stated at the Beatles' 1988 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that there were only two "fifth Beatles": Derek Taylor, the Beatles' public relations manager, and Neil Aspinall, their road manager-turned-business-executive.
Astrid Kirchherr was a German photographer and artist known for her association with the Beatles and her photographs of the band's original members – John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best – during their early days in Hamburg.
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The Quarrymen were a British skiffle/rock and roll group, formed by John Lennon in Liverpool in 1956, which evolved into the Beatles in 1960. Originally consisting of Lennon and several school friends, the Quarrymen took their name from a line in the school song of their school, the Quarry Bank High School. Lennon's mother, Julia, taught her son to play the banjo, showed Lennon and Eric Griffiths how to tune their guitars in a similar way to the banjo, and taught them simple chords and songs.
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Anthony Esmond Sheridan McGinnity, known professionally as Tony Sheridan, was an English rock and roll guitarist who spent much of his adult life in Germany. He was best known as an early collaborator of the Beatles, one of two non-Beatles to receive label performance credit on a record with the group, and the only non-Beatle to appear as lead singer on a Beatles recording which charted as a single.
My Bonnie is a 1962 album by English rock and roll singer-songwriter and musician Tony Sheridan. Sheridan, then playing in clubs in Hamburg with the Beatles, was discovered by producer Bert Kaempfert and subsequently signed with him to record for Polydor. Sheridan recorded several songs with the Beatles, of which only a single was released in 1961, the titular "My Bonnie" and B-side "The Saints", credited to Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers. While both songs are included here, the remaining tracks on this album were credited again to the Beat Brothers but recorded without the Beatles.
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The Star-Club was a music club in Hamburg, Germany, that opened on Friday 13 April 1962, and was initially operated by Manfred Weissleder and Horst Fascher. In the 1960s, many of the giants of rock music played at the club. The club closed on 31 December 1969 and the building it occupied was destroyed by a fire in 1987. The address of the club was Große Freiheit 39 in the St. Pauli quarter of Hamburg. Große Freiheit is a side street of the Reeperbahn. The club had a capacity of 2,000 people, and cinema-style seating.
Backbeat is a 1994 independent drama film directed by Iain Softley. It chronicles the early days of The Beatles in Hamburg, West Germany. The film focuses primarily on the relationship between Stuart Sutcliffe and John Lennon, and also with Sutcliffe's German girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr. It has subsequently been made into a stage production.
Birth of the Beatles is a 1979 American biographical film, produced by Dick Clark Productions and directed by Richard Marquand. It was shown as a TV film on ABC in the United States, and received a theatrical release in other countries. The film focuses on the early history of the Beatles. It was released nine years after the Beatles disbanded, and is the only biographical film about the band to be released while all four members were alive. Pete Best, the Beatles' original drummer, served as a technical advisor for the production.
Allan Richard Williams was a British businessman and promoter who was the original booking agent and first manager of the Beatles. He drove the van to take the young band to Hamburg, West Germany, in 1960, where they gained the vital show business experience that led to their emergence on the world stage. Williams was also a promoter and agent of a number of other Liverpool rock acts, helping stoke the Merseybeat boom of the early 1960s.
Kaiserkeller is a music club in the St. Pauli quarter of Hamburg, Germany, near the Reeperbahn. It was opened by Bruno Koschmider on 14 October 1959. The Beatles had a contract with Kaiserkeller to play there in 1960.
"Be-Bop-a-Lula" is a rockabilly song first recorded in 1956 by Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps.
"Hallelujah I Love Her So" is a single by American musician Ray Charles. The rhythm and blues song was written and released by Charles in 1956 on the Atlantic label, and in 1957 it was included on his self-titled debut LP, also released on Atlantic. The song peaked at number five on the Billboard R&B chart. It is loosely based on 'Get It Over Baby' by Ike Turner (1953).
The Top Ten Club was a music club in Hamburg's St. Pauli district at Reeperbahn 136, which opened on 31 October 1960 and kept its name until 1994.
The original lineup of the Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe and Pete Best, regularly performed at different clubs in Hamburg, West Germany, during the period from August 1960 to May 1962; a chapter in the group's history which honed their performance skills, widened their reputation, and led to their first recording, which brought them to the attention of Brian Epstein. In November and December 1962 they played with Ringo Starr on drums.
Adrian Barber was an English musician and producer most noted for recording the Beatles Live! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962, producing the Allman Brothers Band's self-titled debut album, along with the Velvet Underground's album Loaded.
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