On Feb. 3, 1959, a single-engine Beechcraft Bonanza flying in low visibility crashed north of Clear Lake, Iowa. All four aboard were killed: pilot Roger Peterson and rock & rollers Buddy Holly, 22; The Big Bopper (J.P. Richardson Jr.), 28; and Ritchie Valens (Richard Valenzuela), 17. The three were stars of the Winter Dance Party Tour of the Midwest.
Feb. 3 is called The Day the Music Died, the title taken from the lyrics of Don McLean’s cryptic early ‘70s hit “American Pie.”
There’s a rock & roll legend around Feb. 6 as well. It’s not as poignant or tragic but it definitely deals with loss. Or potential loss. We’ll call it The Day the Music Passed.
Feb. 6 is the day in 1962 that Dick Rowe of Decca Records passed on signing The Beatles, telling the group’s manager, Brian Epstein, that “guitar groups are on the way out.”
The previous month, on Jan. 1 (New Year’s Day wouldn’t be a British holiday until 1974), The Beatles recorded a 15-song demo for Decca Records in London. The quartet made the 200-plus mile drive from Liverpool in horrid winter weather hoping the audition would win them a recording contract. It didn’t.
The “guitar groups” quote comes from Epstein’s autobiography, A Cellarful of Noise. The story of Decca’s rejection has become a legend and, as with many legends, it’s been told and retold, with dates, names and so on getting jumbled along the way. And so, some things to consider:
- Dick Rowe denies saying guitar groups were on the way out. Someone else with Decca may have said it, or maybe Epstein made up the quote. But Rowe pleaded not guilty.
- Decca signed another guitar group, just not The Beatles. Brian Poole & the Tremeloes hailed from London. Decca figured if they had to have a guitar group, get a local one.
- Decca also turned down the Kinks, The Who and The Yardbirds.
- If you heard the audition, you might have passed too. The band, well knackered after the drive, went directly into the studio to record a selection of standards, early rock & roll tunes and three Lennon-McCartney originals. The session was over in an hour. Most of the tunes recorded were first takes. Hints of future greatness are buried pretty deep.
- The Beatles already had been turned down by several labels, including EMI, with which they eventually signed.
- Consolation prize? George Harrison hipped Dick Rowe to another guitar group that looked promising. Hence, Decca signed and unleashed upon the world the Rolling Stones, successfully marketing them as the anti-Beatles.
- Would The Beatles have conquered the world if they’d signed to Decca? Smart money says no, for one reason: George Martin. Martin was a staff producer at EMI who mostly recorded comedy albums. Assigned to shepherd the scruffy Liverpudlians through the recording process, Martin facilitated The Beatles’ transformation from rockin’ little combo into something the likes of which the world had never seen. His skills brought the Fab Four’s musical ambitions to reality, and his commitment to quality control made those recordings timeless.
- Also, Martin said that on the basis of the Decca audition tape, he wouldn’t have signed The Beatles either.
Assuming The Beatles would have become, you know, THE BEATLES, regardless of which label signed them assumes every label had a producer as specifically suited to the band as was George Martin. This seems unlikely.
What seems not at all unlikely is that had Decca signed The Beatles, the band would have languished in the lower levels of the label’s priorities until they were cut, sending the boys back to the grim nightclubs of Berlin or the docks of Liverpool. I mean, when’s the last time you heard from Brian Poole & the Tremoloes?
Instead, they came as close to creating magic as mortals can. And we have a catalog of some of the greatest music ever made at our fingertips.
So, thanks Decca, Dick Rowe and everyone who passed on The Beatles. If the music died on 2/3/59, you aided in its resurrection.