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The following information was collected for personal use from the multitude of various magazines and interviews issued around the time of the Anthology. At the time, much of the material was quickly collected without any reference to its source, however most of the information sources used have since been identified. No attempt is being made to claim authorship nor infringe any copyrights and the material is reproduced here for private use by Beatles fans.
If I've unintentionally neglected to credit anybody for either information or images then I offer my sincere apologies; please contact me and I will rectify the omission or if preferred remove the material.
Many thanks to Paul and Steve for offering to host the material at http://whizzo.ca/beatles/rs/gobnotch.html and http://abbeyrd.best.vwh.net/ respectively.
The material follows roughly the same format as Lewisohn's Complete Beatles Recording Sessions book, and does not cover any of the Anthology related promo CDs, none of which seemed to include any exclusive musical material not also released on the comercially available Anthology releases.
Amendments, suggestions and new material would be warmly welcomed.
George, Paul and Ringo convened (accompanied by their respective wives) at George's studio at his Friar Park mansion, apparently to perform a symbolic version of Let It Be.
John's absence was apparently so overwhelming that, after a long private discussion between the three out in the garden, the idea was abandoned and the Fab Three turned their hands instead to re-working rock and roll classics much favoured from their Quarry Men and pre-Beatlemania days. Ringo confirmed that the trio played an acoustic jam, "It was just two acoustic guitars and me on brushes"
Jeff Lynne: "It was just like a time-warp kind of thing. we played some old rock-and-roll stuff, a couple of Chuck Berry's, even I Saw Her Standing There."
The jam was filmed for possible inclusion in the upcoming Anthology videos but, in the end, only a minute long segment of the threesome performing Blue Moon Of Kentucky was screened publicly (on the television program 'Good Morning America' December 6th 1996) and a small segment featuring Ringo drumming along to Love Me Do can also be found on the Anthology videos.
The videos also include an extremely brief run through of the White Album track I Will and a longer performance of the unreleased Harrison song Derradune (both performed out in the garden rather than the studio).
Speaking in late 1996, Bob Smeaton, Anthology TV series director, was quite enthusiastic about the Friar Park recordings:
Smeaton: "The more we include of the three guys together, the more we realise that John isn't there. In years to come people might get the chance to see that footage of the three of them playing together at George's place. Knowing the way Apple works, it'll come out eventually, in some shape or form. There's a whole load of that stuff, we were there for a full day and the Beatles started playing songs like Thinking Of Linking and Ain't She Sweet. A little bit of this film was used when George sang Derradune. They did a whole load of rock'n'roll songs. And we shot a load of stuff at Abbey Road, with the three guys and George Martin, which was fantastic. For the Beatles fan, it's priceless, I'm sure that somewhere down the line, that stuff will come out."
Unconfirmed press reports at the time claimed that George, Paul and Ringo had now completed around ten hours of recordings, prompting rumours that the trio were working on an entire album. What exactly was recorded (apart from the above specified tracks) is still a mystery, although it’s unlikely those ten hours of tape all comprise new Beatles songs. The August 1994 Beatles Monthly reported that in recent weeks the Beatles 'came up with some fresh musical ideas for the soundtrack of their Anthology video series’ and speculated the bulk of the recordings may also be comprised of ‘warm-up demos’.
Sources include: Goldmine Magazine; Beatles Monthly No. 220 Aug 94, No. 249 Jan 97 (Beat Publications Ltd), Daily Mail 24th Jun 94, Sun News Services 20 June 96.
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Don't miss the Whizzo page on The Beatles Anthology book, CDs and DVD!
November 30 1994