Yesterday

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A few years back, a colleague my age told me that he was working with an assistant who was 19 years old.  Paul McCartney came up in a discussion, and the assistant said, "Now, wasn't Paul McCartney in another band before he was with Wings?"
 
In 1965 the Beatles appeared on Ed Sullivan and performed four songs as a group and Paul performed Yesterday solo. He was sitting on a chair in back of the curtains waiting to go on when the guy who was there to make sure the curtains opened properly said to him "Are you nervous?". Paul very confidently said "Not at all, I am a professional". The guy said  "Well you should be, there are 70 million people watching you."  And with that the curtains opened up. No pressure.
 
The Beatles had played countless gigs and TV shows in Europe and the UK before the Ed Sullivan show. I doubt there were any nerves.
 
LOL. Even though the number of people watching the Sullivan show substantially exceeded the entire population of the UK, I seriously doubt if there were any nerves. Or at least not any different than the usual opening number prep.
 
I remember that show well, am I old? ;D We grew up in a small town and had never heard of them. My sister and I were amazed at the frenzied crowd at the airport and wondered who are these guys, we weren't long figuring it out.
 
It was a funny story Tom, and would be even funnier if he'd really been nervous.

Playing in front of TV cameras gives the artist no clue of the size of the viewing audience  ;)  Personally, although I've performed (and spoken) in front of numerous live audiences, I have a brain fart when speaking to/in front of a TV camera. I've recorded numerous video 'speakies" over the years, but it doesn't take much to get me off track.

I'd forgotten about it until a few years ago, when our daughter was approached by a TV news reporter in a campground; She said "wait a minute and I'll get my Dad, he can speak better to that subject". I had no idea there would be a camera in my face when she called me out of the coach. My brain couldn't function very well, and my mouth was blurting out stuff  :-[

I had no clue what the size of the viewing audience was and, for all I knew, it could have been a fake camera  :eek:
 
... the number of people watching the Sullivan show substantially exceeded the entire population of the UK

Curiosity got the better of me  ;D

Ed Sullivan Show audience for the Beatles in Feb, 1964: estimated 73M.
UK population in 1964: approx 55M.
 
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