On this Day

Liverpool, Merseyside – The 6th of July 1957

Chance or fate? It was certainly at a fete that John Lennon and Paul McCartney first met.

Lennon had put together a skiffle group, the Quarrymen, complete with washboard-player and tea-chest bass. The group arrived at St Peter's Church on the back of a lorry, part of a procession attracting people to the event. Paul McCartney had just wandered along, and was drawn by the tinny tannoy playing the somewhat raw sounds of the schoolboy band.

Later when the band was preparing to play at the fete itself McCartney was introduced to Lennon by a mutual friend. Lennon was 16 and the obvious leader of the makeshift musicians; McCartney a year younger, but with the confidence gained from good looks, a place at the prestigious Liverpool Institute, and a gift for music – he showed Lennon how to tune his guitar, and played some rock and roll on the church piano, as well as doing impressions of stars like Gene Vincent and Little Richard.

Lennon liked being top-dog; but he was taken with the talented younger lad; within a fortnight McCartney had been invited to join; and the rest is music history.

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