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.
In 1961, the Beatles performed 92 times at the Top Ten Club.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Reeperbahn 136 was the location of the Grand Hippodrom and Café of Carl Richter [1] Later it was called Hippodrom [2] [3] and belonged, together with the bar, to Herbert Eckhorn. [4] In 1960, the heir to the hippodrome, Peter Eckhorn (* 12 February 1939 in Hamburg; † 19 May 1979), decided to close the hippodrome, rebuild it and reopen it with a new name as a music club. [5] The Top Ten Club was opened on 31 October 1960 by Peter Eckhorn and his manager Horst Fascher. [6] After disagreements, Peter Eckhorn separated from Horst Fascher shortly afterwards. Fascher then worked as a waiter in a restaurant in the Große Freiheit , where he persuaded Manfred Weissleder to turn the former Stern cinema into a music club, the Star-Club, becoming his manager. [7]
The Beatles, who until 31 December 1960 were under contract with Bruno Koschmider, the owner of Kaiserkeller, often visited Top Ten Club, where Tony Sheridan performed with his Jets. They also played together occasionally, which Bruno Koschmider found out about. On November 21, 1960 George Harrison was deported to England by the police, because at the age of 17 he was too young to work in a nightclub after midnight. It is assumed that it was Bruno Koschmider who tipped off the police because he was annoyed that the Beatles were unfaithful to him and wanted to switch to the Top Ten Club. Consequently, Harrison had to return to Liverpool. [8] [9] [10]
On 29 November 1960, Paul McCartney and Pete Best were arrested for attempted arson. They were said to have set fire to a condom when they packed their personal belongings in Bruno Koschmider's Bambi cinema, where they slept, to bring them to the Top Ten Club. [11] Best and McCartney spent three hours in the Davidwache Police Station, and were deported on 1 December 1960. [12] Lennon returned to Liverpool on 10 December, with Sutcliffe following in February 1961. [13]
The Beatles appeared back at the Top Ten Club with Tony Sheridan from 1 April 1 to July 1961; together they performed there for 92 nights consecutively. They were to play a total of 503 hours on stage, [14] playing seven hours a night and eight hours at weekends, with a fifteen-minute pause every hour. [15] Each member of The Beatles was to be paid 35 deutschmarks. [16]
Peter Brüchmann documented the Beatles' visit to the Top Ten Club in 1961, though his report did not appear in Quick until 1966. [17] Gerd Mingram photographed the Beatles by chance when he commissioned a trade union newspaper in the Top Ten Club. Some of the photos were sold in the mid-seventies to Paul McCartney for £30,000. [18] [ better source needed ]
This section needs additional citations for verification .(September 2020) |
![]() | This section may contain an excessive amount of intricate detail that may interest only a particular audience.(May 2020) |
Since 1994 there have been about ten changes of ownership, and the club name has changed just as often. The names adopted were: MC-Music Club, [21] new Top Ten Club, Soap Opera, The Irish Harp, La Cage [22] (1997 to 2001), Titty Twister (a name based on the bar Titty Twister in the film From Dusk Till Dawn , from 2002 to 2003), [23] Golden Stars (2003), [24] Glam (2003 to 2005) [25] and La Rocca (2005 to 2006). [26]
Since 2008 the name has been moondoo, [22] and the operator is "Lago Bay Betriebsgesellschaft mbH". [27]
In 1994, the London Club Dome, in Tufnell Park in the London Borough of Islington district, was transformed into the Top Ten Club for the film Backbeat. [28]
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 Quarrymen are a British skiffle and 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.
The Merseybeats are an English band that emerged from the Liverpool Merseybeat scene in the early 1960s, performing at the Cavern Club along with the Beatles, Gerry and the Pacemakers, and other similar artists.
Ronnie Scott OBE was a British jazz tenor saxophonist and jazz club owner. He co-founded Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in London's Soho district, one of the world's most popular jazz clubs, in 1959.
Rory Storm was an English musician and vocalist. Born in Liverpool, Storm was the singer and leader of Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, a Liverpudlian band who were contemporaries of The Beatles in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Ringo Starr was the drummer for the Hurricanes before joining the Beatles in August 1962.
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.
Live! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962 is a double album featuring live performances by the English rock band the Beatles, recorded in late December 1962 at the Star-Club during their final Hamburg residency. The album was released in 1977 in two different versions, comprising a total of 30 songs by the Beatles.
"Carry That Weight" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1969 album Abbey Road. Written by Paul McCartney and credited to Lennon–McCartney, it is the seventh and penultimate song in the album's climactic side-two medley. It features unison vocals in the chorus from all four Beatles, a rarity in their songs. It is preceded by "Golden Slumbers" and segues into "The End".
"P.S. I Love You" is a song recorded by English rock band the Beatles in 1962. It was composed principally by Paul McCartney, and produced by Ron Richards. The song was released in the UK on 5 October 1962 as the B-side of their debut single "Love Me Do" and is also included on their debut album Please Please Me (1963). It was later included on the American release Introducing... The Beatles (1964), its reissue The Early Beatles (1965), and the Beatles compilation album Love Songs (1977).
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.
Horst Fascher is a German music business figure who was a friend and business associate of the Beatles during their early career playing in Hamburg, Germany.
The Undertakers are a British beat group, contemporaries of the Beatles and a leading group in the Merseybeat music scene of the early 1960s.
"Ain't She Sweet" is a song composed by Milton Ager, with lyrics by Jack Yellen. It was published in 1927 by Ager, Yellen & Bornstein, Inc. It became popular in the first half of the 20th century and typified the Roaring Twenties. Like "Happy Days Are Here Again" (1929), it became a Tin Pan Alley standard. Both Ager and Yellen were elected to the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Bruno Koschmider was a German entrepreneur in Hamburg, best known for employing the Beatles in the early 1960s. He controlled various businesses, such as the Bambi Kino, which was a cinema, the Indra club and the Kaiserkeller.
"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 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.
Faron's Flamingos were an English Merseybeat band. Despite their lack of commercial success, they remain an important part of Merseybeat history and have the distinction of being the first major example of the "Mersey Motown" sound with their release of "Do You Love Me".
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: others (link)