Richard Starkey is seventy years old today. You know him better by his stage name, Ringo Starr, drummer for the Beatles, the most famous band in the history of rock and roll, maybe in all of music. My son, Alec, is the big Beatles expert in our family--knows all the songs, probably all the lyrics.
He wasn't born when the band first burst upon there scene in the early 1960s. I was living in London then and -- it's odd to say this about a music group -- the whole country was excited. The world was rocking and rolling to British music, Mary Quant was designing dresses every woman in the West wanted to wear, and the Brits were very proud of all of it. Crowds at airports went bananas when the Beatles came through; I remember being stuck in one once.
It didn't last, of course. John Lennon, arguably the most famous Beatle, was assassinated outside his New York apartment building in 1980. George Harrison, the lead guitarist, died of lung cancer a few years later. Paul McCartney lives on, the most successful ex-Beatle, nine number one singles in his post-Beatles career and a knighthood from the Queen. But when the group was together, it was a time. Oh, what a time it was. Seems like Yesterday.
Happy birthday, Ringo. Let it be.
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