BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

Discuss the early days of the Club with the manager.
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13_temple_street
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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Peter; Thank you for sharing your memories of a wonderful life.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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Thanks from here, too. This is a great thread. :D
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Another version of the Silver Beats appearance at Lathom Hall on May 14th 1960. This version is from Kingsize Taylor and the Dominoes drummer Cliff Roberts recalling the Silver Beats appearance.
They were a scruffy bunch whose drummer hadn't even brought his kit and asked if he could borrow my set of drums I had a brand new Olympic kit that I hadn't used on stage myself , naturally I refused. However I agreed to play with the Silver Beats ,we performed six numbers together,
four 'rock'n'roll standards that all the group played and two originals that they had to teach me.
I was aware that in the early days the group did not have transport and occasionally used public transport or the occasional taxi. Tommy Moore would have a problem transporting his drum kit on the buses. It was only when Pete Best joined the group in August 1960 , that the transport problem was solved, Pete's mother Mona Best, bought them a van. Jeffrey; I am pleased you have again made the leap from the technical side of Rickresource , your comments are always welcome! This important observation, proves the Beatles were in fact writing their original material from the very start of the groups existence.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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notice 1960 new.jpg
I don't know how this Iron Door information notice came into my possession; it was pinned to a notice board in the club in 1960, that was the last time I was aware of it. I have posted it because the document reinforces the fact that the first public appearance by the Beatles (Silver Beetles) was at the Iron Door on May 15th 1960.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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In absence of Mary Deeds, Cliff Poole has my sympathies having to grapple with a manual typewriter he was obviously not familiar with using.

As 17-year old in my final year of State education, and because I wasn’t staying on for the Sixth Form and an extra sweat-and-toil year of GCSE A levels, I was enrolled in a typing class for a couple of terms before being thrown out into the world of work. This is how I was taught to type …



There were some 20 of us in the class, mostly girls but there were a few of us boys also, a portable wind-up gramophone and one 78rpm record that was played repeatedly. One side played the gentle Blue Danube Waltz, this was the warm-up number, while the flip-side was Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King which, as the music got progressively faster, we had to try a keep up with. That’s why I say I have every sympathy with Cliff Poole.

248 was indeed not a bad first time turnout for a May Sunday afternoon. I wonder how many Sunday lunches were missed because of it. Being that the notice ends with members unsuccessfully appealing for a Sunday lunch to be made available for them.

There’s not really a lot out there on the web about Eggy Ley’s Jazzmen and The Pete Ridge Band other than …

Eggy Ley, born in London in 1928, was one of the pioneers of classic soprano saxophone in England. From 1955 to 1961 Eggy Ley and his Jazzmen toured extensively in Germany and recorded for Columbia, Sonet and Brunswick. After returning to London he joined Radio Luxembourg in the 1960s before producing for BFBS in the 70s. From 1983 leading his own Hot Shots, Ley turned professional again, ran a small jazz magazine “Jazzin’ Around” and successfully recorded and toured abroad. He later moved to Vancouver, Canada where he died following a stroke in 1995.

While from the 1961 Roll-call archives of Eel Pie Island:

"Trumpeter Mike Cotton would form his own ‘Jazzmen’ combo out of the ashes of Pete Ridge’s band, taking singer Little Mo (aka Maureen Parfitt) with him, before they morphed into The Mike Cotton Sound when they saw which way the R&B wind was blowing."
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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hamilton_square wrote:In absence of Mary Deeds, Cliff Poole has my sympathies having to grapple with a manual typewriter he was obviously not familiar with using.

As 17-year old in my final year of State education, and because I wasn’t staying on for the Sixth Form and an extra sweat-and-toil year of GCSE A levels, I was enrolled in a typing class for a couple of terms before being thrown out into the world of work. This is how I was taught to type …



There were some 20 of us in the class, mostly girls but there were a few of us boys also, a portable wind-up gramophone and one 78rpm record that was played repeatedly. One side played the gentle Blue Danube Waltz, this was the warm-up number, while the flip-side was Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King which, as the music got progressively faster, we had to try a keep up with. That’s why I say I have every sympathy with Cliff Poole.
Certainly, if he had to use one of these. :mrgreen:
Salter Typewriter.jpg
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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all night session 7 (new) .jpg
little Mo.jpg
Remarkable images and film of typing skills. The typing machine depicted in the film, was not unlike the one that Brian Pool used, we assumed it was abandoned by the previous tenants. It was discovered when we moved into 13 Temple Street; We decided that Eggy Ley warranted a larger venue, he had been involved in producing jazz records in the mid fifties, he was popular in Germany. In fact two coaches of his followers turned up from Germany at St Georges Hall on the night. Pete Ridge Jazz band were frequent visitors to the club Little Mo did not always appear with the band.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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While a million miles away from The Beatles, there’s quite a bit of info out there about the Avon Cities Jazz Band from sea-port city of Bristol in the South-West of England.

Formed in 1949 and remaining active until 2000, the two constant members were trumpeter Geoff Nichols and trombonist Mike Hitchings, while clarinettist Ray Bush reportedly left in 1984 to live in the USA.

Found on You Tube and reportedly from 1977 are several uploads of the Avon Cities Jazz Band performing at an open air venue I know not where …



Also, Dundee, Scotland-born trumpet player and arranger Jimmy Deuchar (1930 – 1993).

According to his bio he did the rounds in British bands led by the likes of Johnny Dankworth, Oscar Rabin, Ronnie Scott and for a while with Kurt Edelhagen over in Germany. However, it was with London-born modern jazz sax player Tubby Hayes that he is perhaps best remembered by British jazz aficionados …

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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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Once again Peter, I was astounded that you managed to find items of interest, (ie.short films representing The Avon Cities Jazz band plus Jimmy Deucher from my posting of an advert in the Liverpool Echo for the promotion at Liverpool's St Georges Hall, featuring Eggy Ley's Jazz Band and others .After viewing, I sat pondering what interesting comments I could partake to visitors, to the forum ,It suddenly dawned on me I could not comment, because I was not at the promotion, more startling this was the very first time I had seen or heard the Avon Cities Jazzmen. I was not impressed with the bands rendering of the Tishomingo Blues, I wondered what my business partner was thinking when he booked an untried ,unknown band from Bristol on to the Liverpool's Jazz scene.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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While I’m not a particular fan of instrumental jazz; though I can listen in awe for hours to the 100+ recordings cut between 1934 and the outbreak of World War II by the magical pairing of Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli A.K.A. Quintette du Hot Club de France, I have to agree with you Geoff that The Avon Cities Jazz Band didn’t strike me as anything special either.

However, I was impressed with the trumpet playing virtuosity of Jimmy Deuchar. According to his bio he wasn’t always in the best of health and died at the relatively young age of 63 in 1993. Though they were to go in different musical directions, reading Deuchar’s bio I was reminded of Liverpool’s sax playing Howie Casey. Being that both musicians learned to play their respective instruments while fulfilling their National Service obligations in the army.

Here’s a question for you Geoff, leaving aside the coming of the electric guitar playing groups who played at the Iron Door Club, who were the performers who played the club prior to that coming would you have paid money at the door to watch and listen to?
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Peter; Recent viewing of the Liverpool Echo and Daily Post Jazz advertisement column for 1960 indicates that Jimmy Deucher visited the Iron Door club in Temple Street on three separate occasion's ,one with Tubby Hayes. Jim Deucher was a brilliant soloist and arranger, possessing a unusual technique, on one of his rare appearances he indicated to me that he liked the Parisian cotton club style of décor in the club and was always pleased to return. On stage he appeared to be obsessed with his trumpet mouthpiece, reverting to change it after a few numbers.
I have thought about your challenge of paying to revisit prebooked jazz bands. I have narrowed the extensive list of bands to just three; Kenny Ball and his Jazzmen , The Crane River Jazz band, Noel Walker Stompers . This choice does not only reflect the musical competence of the chosen bands, but personal acknowledgments .I would not hesitate to rekindle and book any of the bands that appeared at the iron Door in1960/61/62.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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Geoff; you might have an high opinion of Noel Walker as a musician, but as an A&R man and record producer with Decca Records The Big Three had the polar opposite opinion of him. It was Noel Walker who was in charge of the Big Three’s 1963 live recording session at The Cavern. Reportedly Decca’s recording engineers experimented for near three days with sound equipment, while on the day the live recording session turned into a 10-hour marathon because of technical problems. All in all, it is said that The Big Three recorded a total of 19 tracks, of which 4 eventually found their way onto the EP The Big Three At The Cavern. The other 15 tracks disappeared into the vaults of Decca Records and were never seen again.

Noel Walker was also behind the glass on the two unsatisfactory occasions The Big Three were inside Decca’s recording studios. The general consensus being they did not speak the same musical language. In the words of The Big Three’s Brian Griffiths:

Decca couldn’t grasp the notion that many of the Liverpool bands didn’t want to sound like the British rock’n’rollers of the 50s. We were playing songs by American R&B singers unknown in England. Being a trio, we played the music more aggressively and this was not accepted in the studio.
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Mike McCombe’s article reminded me of the reason Noel Walker’s Stompers were performing on Sunday at the Iron Door club; this relates to the information previously mentioned on this page regarding the facilities fine imposed on the club by the Liverpool City Magistrates. Unable to trade and pay the bills, inevitably the bailiffs arrived and removed everything of value in the club, virtually leaving just a shell.They reluctantly left the 40 ft solid mahogany bar, I decided to cut it in half and transport one half up a steep flight of stairs to the first floor, where I proposed a new cloak room. I asked Noel if he and his Stompers would attempt to transport the very heavy counter up to the first floor, no hesitation, along with some huffing and puffing they succeeded. The reward was six straight bookings for the band on a Sunday night.
It was a very sad day when Noel (alias Whistling Jack Smith) informed me that he had accepted a post from Decca Recording company to become one of their record producers, the band was disbanding, Noel Walker Stompers were uniquely placed to equal some of the best bands from London and Manchester.
(This post is a extract from an article subscribed to North West Jazz). Noel informed me in conversation of the difficulty with the acoustics, he and the team of sound engineers sent by Decca to the Cavern club. I asked him why he did not consider recording the Big Three in the Iron Door ,he replied he was under strict instructions to use the Cavern.
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Re: BEATLES FIRST PUBLIC APPEARANCE

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Reading up on the New Orleans inspired Crane River Jazz Band, Geoff’s number one pick of whom he’d pay money to watch perform, Ken Colyer by all accounts was one divisive character. It was his way or the highway. According to the below You Tube clip, Colyer upset a fair few of his fellow British jazz musicians with his unswerving devotion to the traditional jazz of New Orleans. In particular trombonist Chris Barber, who together with clarinettist Monty Sunshine, was instrumental in forming Ken Colyer’s Jazzmen following Colyer’s forced deportation from the US and return to Britain in 1952. The Colyer-Barber-Sunshine association was to last less than two years before it acrimoniously fell apart …



Believe it or not, it was the result of that Colyer-Barber-Sunshine split that was to ultimately inspire The Beatles and a multitude of other Liverpool groups that were to pass in and out of the Iron Door Club. One of the members of Ken Colyer’s Jazzmen being a Glasgow-born banjo player by the name of Lonnie Donegan (see below image) …
KC's Jazzmen.jpg
Lonnie Donegan on the left of a seated Ken Colyer with Chris Barber on the right.

Following Colyer’s departure, the renamed Chris Barber’s Jazz Band began featuring Lonnie Donegan and two other band members in what was announced to audiences as a “skiffle break”. Out would come a cheap acoustic guitar, a washboard and a homemade tea-chest bass as the makeshift trio began rattling off numbers by the likes of Lead Belly and Woody Guthrie. And, so was born the do-it-yourself form of “youth” music know as Skiffle that was to inspire so many British teenagers towards the end of the 1950s to have a go for themselves.
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freddyfowell1.png
johnny image (1).png


A wonderful absorbing post Peter; The Crane River Jazz Band visited the Iron Door on three occasion's in 1960, Ken Colyer had departed the band , however on one occasion in early 1960 Ken Colyer appeared as a dep trumpeter at the club,with the band.
The Iron Door acquired a repetition for promoting modern Jazz; modern jazz enthusiast's travelled great distances to listen to this specialised music. Johnny Dankworth was probably the most popular modern jazz musician, he had a phenomenal following .I have posted this image of Sir John Dankworth taken after he had just finished his set at the Iron Door (aka Storyville Jazz club) surrounded by my two managers Clem Dalton and Brian(Jessy) James. Both have ventured onto this forum. Johnny Dankworth had complained to me he was not happy being on the same promotion as a Rock'n' Roll upstart's like Freddie Fowell. He was not too pleased with my reply. Once again Peter thank you for the historic information, referring to the pioneering musician's of jazz in this country.
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