Beatles And The Hurricanes example essay topic

A First Person Ringo Starr Biography From Birth Through The Beatles A Brief and Hopefully Accurate Summary of the Life and Times of Ringo Starr. I, Ringo Starr, was born on July seventh, 1940. I was named after my father. I was the only child of Richard Starkey and Elsie G leave. The two had met while working together at a local bakery. They eventually married in 1936.

My family resided at 9 Madryn Street, a six-room terrace house in a poor and rough working class section of Liverpool known as the Dingle. My father had left home when I was 3 years old. In 1944, My mother and I moved to 10 Admiral Grove, a smaller, less expensive terrace house around the corner. I called 10 Admiral Grove home until I moved to London with the Beatles. Determined to support herself and me, Elsie went to work as a barmaid, often leaving me in the care of neighbors or my paternal grandparents.

At the age of five, I started school at St. Silas Infants School, but my school career hit the first of many snags when, at age six, I developed appendicitis. My appendix ruptured resulting in peritonitis and a ten week coma. My mother was told on several occasions that I would not live, but eventually, to the doctor's surprise, I came round and slowly began to mend. After six months, recovery was within sight, but then disaster struck.

I fell out of the hospital bed necessitating an additional six month hospital stay. When I was finally released, I found that I was very behind in his school work. I couldn't read or write, so a neighbor child, Marie Maguire, was recruited to help teach me. I never cared much for school, and the fact that I was so far behind didn't help.

I would often play truant, a fact that no doubt influenced my dismal showing on the Review exam. Since I didn't pass the Review, I didn't even take the Eleven Plus exam and, as a result, wound up at Dingle vale Secondary Modern School at age eleven. In 1953, with my enthusiastic blessing, Elsie married Harry Graves. That same year I developed pleurisy. Complications resulted in another hospitalization, this one lasting two years.

Despite all these hardships, I, by all accounts, remained a contented easy-going individual if somewhat quiet and thoughtful. When I emerged from the hospital at fifteen, I knew that returning to school was out of the question. I had simply missed too much and felt that I could never catch up. After a recouperatory period at home it was time to start thinking about finding a job. I took a messenger job with the British Railroad, but had to quit when I failed the medical exam.

I next worked as a barman on a boat that traveled between Liverpool and Wales, but I was fired when I turned up for work in an inebriated state and lipped off to my boss. Finally, when I was seventeen, I took a job at Henry Hunt and Son's engineering firm as an apprentice joiner. It was about this time that the skiffle craze hit. Me and Eddie Miles, another apprentice at H. Hunt and Son, started the Eddie Clayton skiffle group. With me handling the percussive duties, us and other similarly minded employees would entertain the workers at lunch time. After hours our strictly amateur group played at parties and local competitions.

In December of 1957, Harry Graves bought me my first real set of drums. It was second-hand set costing all of ten pounds which Harry hand carried from London to Liverpool by train. This rather ramshackle set was eventually replaced with a new black Premier kit for which I borrowed half the cost from my grandfather. Eventually I joined the Dark town Skiffle group, but it was not uncommon for me to sit in with other bands. One of these was Al Caldwell's Texans with whom I first drummed in March 1959. In November of 1959 I officially joined the band, now calling ourselves Rory Storm And the Hurricanes and fronted by the charismatic Alan Caldwell.

The Hurricanes and our intrepid leader were known as much for our outlandish dress and exuberant stage performance as for our music and by 1960, we were the top ranked band in Liverpool. 1960 not only brought the band an offer of a thirteen week summer engagement at Butlins in Pwllheli, Wales, but also a big dilemma for myself. In order to accompany the band to Pwllheli, I would have to give up my apprenticeship at Hunt and Son. My parents desperately tried to persuade him to stay with the program as did my fiancee, a lass named Geraldine. However, the lure of twenty pounds a week proved to be too much.

The engagement was called off, the day job was abandoned, and I traipsed off to a rather damp summer of adventure with Rory, John Byrnes, Charles O'Brien, and Wally Edmond. Ever the showman, Rory who had already changed his name, suggested that I adopt a flashier stage name. Because of my penchant for wearing rings on my fingers, I naturally evolved into "Rings" and then quickly mor fed into the more Western sounding "Ringo". My last name, Starkey, became shortened to Starr because it fit better with Ringo and so that my solo offering could be billed as "Starr Time".

My big numbers included "Boys", "You " re Sixteen,"Big Noise From Wine tka", and "Alley Oop". By the fall of 1960, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes were topping the bill at the Kaiser keller in Hamburg where I made the acquaintance of another Liverpool band, the Beatles. The Beatles had been hired to play at a much less prestigious club, the Rathskeller. The Beatles and The Hurricanes shared the grueling dusk till dawn schedule and despite the fact that the Hurricanes were paid considerably more money and had better accommodations, are two groups became friends.

I got on well with all the Beatles, most notably George Harrison, and would often stay around during the Hurricane's off periods listening to the Beatles. During this stint in Hamburg I joined Lou Walters, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison at Aku stik Studios where the joint members of our hurricanes / Beatles backed Lou Walter's renditions of "Summertime". After Butlins, Hamburg, and a stint playing US air bases in France, Rory and the band returned to Liverpool and the local rounds. On several occasions I joined the Beatles substituting for their drummer Pete Best. And in 1962 I finally joined them. The Beatles, who had recently been offered a recording contract with EMI, had for a variety or reasons, become dissatisfied with Pete Best.

When their producer, George Martin, expressed doubts about Pete's drumming ability, they decided the time had come to let him go. Since they had worked with me before and discovered that they all liked my drumming style and personality, I was the natural choice for Pete's replacement. However, even though I showed up for the first official gig with my hair combed into the appropriate Beatle style, it took a while for me to feel comfortable in the closely knit Beatle fraternity. I felt myself something of the newcomer and outsider, apparently not without reason. I was not even told of John Lennon's wedding to Cynthia Powell on August twenty-third. I served the Beatles well.

As a drummer I never tried to overshadow the music, working always with the song and the singer. On stage I seemed content to stay in the background feeding the others with my steady backbeat. Despite my rather sad looking expression, I was a happy and sensitive individual. On February 11, 1965, I married my Liverpool sweetheart, Mary (Maureen) Cox. We had met back in the Cavern days when she had been a student hairdresser. Our love endured the manifestations of Beatlemania, my move to London, the seemingly endless rounds of tours, and the fact that our romance had to be kept secret from the fans.

When I had to have my tonsils removed in early December of 1964, Maureen came to London to nurse me. When she discovered that she was pregnant, the marriage was quickly arranged. We had a lovely child and named it Zak Starkey. He was born on December 13, 1965. I, having always longed for siblings myself, wanted to make sure that my baby boy experienced such joys.

Zak was followed by Jason on August 19, 1967 and sister Lee on November 11, 1970... Our divorce in July of 1975 came as a shock to many. I continued with the Beatles until our breakup in 1970. After this I continued making albums, with different personality's like Bruce Spring sting. In 1986, I had a serious intestinal problem, and had to be rushed to the hospital. I was near death, but I came through all right.

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