Informative Essay Aiyanna Tibbetts

The Beatles

When I was about seven years old, i went to my grandma's house a lot. And she happened to like older music, considering she was old. When I'd help her clean she'd always play music like Elvis and The Temptations and The Beatles. Around then is probably when I started to like them. When I was ten I started to drift away from that kind of music, more on the pop side I guess. But after my grandma died last year I started listening again and got into other bands like The Rolling Stones. And I guess I was always curious to how the Beatles became famous and become known in America, since they were British. It took the Beatles a year to be known in England, but it only took them six weeks to become famous in America.

To some it may seem as though the Beatles came out of nowhere, but they had to come from somewhere. That somewhere is Liverpool, where they played small gigs and were quite known and loved. They went around playing their own music and making songs and having fun, they didn't think they'd get so famous. But they were famous in their small town before they started making records, they were a small big deal. And from Liverpool it took them about a year to make their way through England and the U.K and become famous on the way. They toured around the U.K, playing gigs and shows, and they already had a fairly large audience, but their fame kept growing. The Beatles released their song, "Please Please Me", which hit No. 1 on the U.K charts.

From England to America, the Beatles fame happened more quickly, taking about six weeks for almost everyone in America to join Beatlemania. The first Beatles song heard in America was "I Want To Hold Your Hand", but it was not released by Capitol Records. On December 17th, 1963, Marsha Albert brought in a copy of "I Want To Hold Your Hand" to a local radio station (Gilmore). Capitol Records did not release the song until December 26th (Gilmore). A couple months later, on February 15th, 1964, the Beatles landed at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York (Gilmore). Their arrival was a little bit crazy, you could say. They arrived to thousands of fans, screaming and excited for their appearance. The Beatles were shocked, they were used to crowds, but this was hysteria. Two days later they made their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. They played for a live audience and for a television audience. It was the largest television audience in history, around 73 million people watching from home (Fricke). And the live audience was in hysterics. Hundreds of screaming girls were there, the Beatles couldn't be heard over the all the excitement.

Even through all the negativity and the craze, the Beatles still had fun and enjoyed themselves. Between being mobbed by fans and mobbed by paparazzi, they managed to stay calm. The paparazzi threw negative comments and questions at them, but the Beatles threw back witty responses. They never let mean reports or programs on the news faze them. They knew their fans loved them. They continued to return the Sullivan's show, up until their breakup in 1970. Ed Sullivan died four years later in 1974 (Fricke). Every time they went back they always got a positive reaction from the audience, but it could never have been like the first time.

Works cited

Fricke, David. "BEATLE MANIA!" Rolling Stone. 2/19/2004, p38-44. Web.
Gilmore, Mikal. "HOW THE BEATLES TOOK AMERICA." Rolling Stone. 1/16/2014, p40-69. Web.
Greenberg, Steve. "How The Beatles Went Viral." Billboard. 1/18/2014, p24-33. Web.

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