Although The Beatles’ popularity had been growing steadily and to increasingly frantic heights throughout 1963, their appearance at the London Palladium on Sunday 13 October catapulted them into the attentions of the mainstream media, who coined the term ‘Beatlemania’ to describe the scenes of screaming fans.
Val Parnell’s Sunday Night At The London Palladium was a variety entertainment programme that regularly drew huge British TV audiences of up to 15 million people. Competition to appear was fierce, and The Beatles were taking no chances, having spent the previous evening rehearsing.
On the night they appeared briefly at the beginning of the show, before compère Bruce Forsythe told the audience, “If you want to see them again they’ll be back in 42 minutes.”
And indeed they were. The Beatles topped the bill that night, closing the hour-long show. They began with ‘From Me To You’, followed by ‘I’ll Get You’, which was introduced by Paul McCartney with some jovial interjections from John Lennon.
Their most recent hit, ‘She Loves You’, was next, announced collectively by Lennon, McCartney and George Harrison.
Then came the finale. Paul McCartney attempted to announce it, but was drowned out by the screams from the frenzied audience. Lennon told them to “shut up”, a gesture which was applauded by the older members in the audience. McCartney then asked them all to clap and stamp their feet, and they began ‘Twist And Shout’.
The Beatles’ appearance featured on the ITN news, complete with footage from the group’s dressing room. The following day, meanwhile, newspaper reporters wrote breathless front-page stories about the screaming fans.
The group’s status as a new phenomenon was confirmed, with Beatlemania dominating the airwaves and press for years to come.
I thought you might be interested in an extract from my book “Diary of a Musician”
Sunday 13th October 1963
Beatlemania was officially born on Sunday 13th October 1963 when the Beatles appeared on the top variety show of the time, Sunday Night at The London Palladium which was introduced by Bruce Forsyth. The show normally opened with a dance group called the Tiller Girls, but on this night, the curtains opened and there were the Beatles singing just the opening verse of “Please Please Me”. The audience went wild with girls screaming at the tops of their voices. The curtains closed and for the next forty odd minutes Bruce Forsyth had a tough job trying to keep the audience from screaming during the other acts which consisted of a singer called Brook Benton and Des O’Connor.
Finally Bruce appeared on stage dressed in a “Beatles” collarless suit and a wig and said “I thought I’d be a dead ringer for Ringo,— are you ready—are you steady— 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, the Beatles”. Cue for pandemonium as they sang “From Me To You”, “I’ll Get You”, “She Loves You” and finally “Twist and Shout”. The papers the following day reported the scenes of screaming fans inside and outside The Palladium and one of the papers coined the phrase, “Beatlemania”. I still have my original reel to reel tape of the show, recorded with a microphone in front of the TV. It was just a year since the release of their first record “Love Me Do” (5/10/1962) and yet with only eighteen songs commercially available the Beatles were already the biggest pop act this country had ever seen, and nobody, and I’m sure, not even the Beatles themselves realised that the best was yet to come.
One thing the Beatles suffered from this evening was something that would often occur when they performed live on television, and that was bad sound balancing. Whoever was balancing the sound would often assume that there had to be a lead singer which wasn’t always the case. The Beatles would use only two microphones on stage and when they sang songs like “From Me to You”, and “She Loves You”, John and Paul used separate mikes but would both be singing the lead line and occasionally breaking off into a harmony, sometimes with George joining them. At the beginning of their first number “From Me to You”, Paul’s microphone was hardly on so the sound was a bit odd. What should have happened was the two mikes should have been left at the same volume leaving the Beatles to balance themselves vocally, which is what they had been used to doing after playing up to six hours a night in German clubs.
Hi Paul, I would be interested in hearing your reel to reel tape of the Beatles London Palladium show.
I remember watching all the palladium shows where the Beatles were on. But one stands out for me but I cant remember which one it was. Bruce did a wind up sketch where he and 3 other guys pretended to be the Beatles in silhouette. Obviously, lots of screaming. Then the stage lights went up showing Bruce and a group of cleaners. The drum kit was made up from cleaning buckets, the guitars were mops. It was hilarious. Would love to see that sketch again. Do you remember which episode it was? Seem to recall it was the 1963 one.
I could vaguely remember watching the beatles on sunday night at the london palladium singing she loves you and its great that ive finally managed to find information that confirms it i can also vaguely remember the rolling stones on sunday night at the london palladium singing jumping jack flash and cliff and the shadows doing bachelor boy
My husband is a great fan of the Beatles and I said I remember seeing them on tv the first time at the Palladium. I was eight. I remember my father making commenrs about their hair and my mum telling him to be quiet!
Hello, I’m from Mexico. I’m a great fan of the Fab Four, and I like to thank for this awesome article. I really enjoy it. I wasn’t born yet, when they played at the Palladium, but I could imagine it! It had to be oustanding!
there were also huge sound problems on the much admired sullivan show. it hasn’t been written about much.
And yet the “Sullivan” show had the best engineered sound on TeeVee. It was actually modern.
i recall paul singing without music ,could have been fool on the hill
That song was 4 years later, by the time of which The Beatles stopped touring altogether.
The song was: ‘Till There was You’
On that day, my girlfriends and I were among the crowd outside The London Palladium. We were so sure that we’d be able to see The Beatles arrive, but someone told us that they had arrived early, and were probably rehearsing! We stayed outside for quite a long time, even though we were freezing! Finally, we decided to leave, and were back home in plenty of time to see the show on the telly!
So happy that I was right there on the day that Beatlemania was born…a wonderful experience!
My memory is that it was not actually the Beatles who appeared at the beginning of the show. It was 4 figures in silhouette miming. When the lights went up they were holding cleaning implements not guitars. Far from having difficulty controlling the audience, it is my memory that Bruce Forsythe actively contributed to the increasing hysteria. Can anyone confirm my memory? Went to the Palladium last night to see the Analogues -BRILLIANT!!!!
Yes your quite right Paul, it was Bruce Forsyth and others silhouetted at the beginning of the show as ‘cleaners’. Well remembered !
Yes, correct. I’ve posted about this too. Would love to see that again. Was hilarious.
That’s exactly how I remember too.
Thanks to Chris and John for confirming my memory. Just under six weeks later,my mate and I were cutting pieces out of whichever newspaper coined the term Beatlemania. The reports were interspersed with”banners” that read ‘Beatlemania’. We were sticking these into a scrap book. Suddenly there was a Newsflash ( remember those?) on the television. A shooting in Dallas, Texas. The rest is history. Not such a remarkable feat of memory as everyone can remember what they were doing when they heard the news.
To my knowledge, no visual of the performance still exists. I wonder why that is?