Tony Sheridan
John Lennon’s alter ego?
Tony Sheridan began life as Anthony Esmond Sheridan McGinnity. His early life had many parallels with that of John Lennon. Both were born in 1940 and experienced early paternal abandonment. This emotional disturbance apart, neither was particularly deprived in material terms
Both attended prestigious grammar schools but essentially sabotaged the academic opportunities these offered. In their teens, they shared a reputation for physical aggression and wayward behaviour.
It was Sheridan — he would adopt his mother’s maiden name — who experienced the most extreme contrasts. At one point his mother (an aspirant classical pianist) left him in the care of a children’s home. Later, she sent him to the City of Norwich Boys’ Grammar School, where his musical talent was recognised and nurtured.
Like Lennon, Sheridan, caught the skiffle bug in 1956. When his school skiffle group, the Saints, won a local talent contest, he promptly abandoned school and Norwich. Soon The fifteen-old was playing gigs in the famous Soho coffee bar the 2i’s.
In 1958 Sheridan first came to the attention of the future Beatles by becoming the first individual performer to play electric guitar on British television. By 1960 his Oh Boy! appearances had earned him a place on a UK tour featuring American rock royalty, Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochrane.
The tour (literally) rocked up in Liverpool and for the last night, April 16, in Bristol. After the show Vincent and Cochrane hired a car to take them to London for a night on the town. Sheridan tried to tag along but was perhaps too young and too far down the bill for such an honour.
Sheridan drowned his sorrows with his first (quarter) bottle of whisky. The next day he learned that the snub had proved his luckiest break yet. The hire-car had not reached the bright lights, crashing just outside Cheltenham. Cochrane was killed Vincent seriously injured.
Hamburg, 1960–61
In his telling, the tragedy does not appear to have affected Sheridan unduly. Other reports suggest that in the following months his already volatile behaviour ‘went haywire’. British bookings were drying up when he received an invitation to play in Hamburg, Germany.
In Hamburg, with its drunken sailors, gangsters and prostitutes, ‘haywire’ behaviour was less frowned upon — though even in this permissive environment Tony pushed his luck
Very soon, ‘the mad Englishman’ was a major celebrity in the small septic pond that was the Reeperbahn club scene. That Sheridan was in situ was a major draw for The Beatles who pitched up in the port city a couple of months later. Within hours of his arrival, an awestruck sixteen-year-old George Harrison was having a guitar tutorial with the first ‘famous’ person he had ever known.
Though the same age as John and Ringo — Sheridan became a mentor to his Liverpudlian peers. Much more technically accomplished, he taught them key aspects of musicianship, song selection and stagecraft. He also was a role model for dealing with the less salubrious aspects of the club scene: including the use of amphetamines to deal with all night sessions.
During their second period in Hamburg, The Beatles began performing with Sheridan, who generally worked with pick-up bands. This undoubtedly improved their musicianship but there was a downside. The intensity of Sheridan’s approach exacerbated intra-band tension. This frequently erupted into fist fights.
Even during performances, Sheridan’s temper could not be held in check. He would regularly leap into the audience to take on patrons ‘looking at his bird’. That said, he did have a finely attuned antenna for which underworld figures to avoid. On one occasion he warned Paul against cosying up with one particularly dangerous individual.
Independently, Ringo had a brief unhappy experience performing unrehearsed songs as a Sheridan sideman.
Recording
Amidst the mayhem, famed producer Bert Kaempfert came to see Sheridan and The Beatles at The Top Ten Club. Impressed by the energy on display Kaempfert invited Sheridan to record a single for Polydor (Hamburg).
Early in the morning of 22 June 1961, the young English musicians trooped out to a school concert hall in a Hamburg suburb. Having stayed up all night, they were on what Sheridan called a ‘preludian high’ as they completed their first recording session.
The tracks included My Bonnie (with Sheridan’s arrangement). This was popular at the Top Ten and regularly sang in German schools. They also covered When the Saints Go Marching in and a couple of rock and roll standards.
In the week after the recording, the Beatles Hamburg era effectively came to an end. Stuart left and Paul switched to bass. Recording contracts were signed with Polydor (Germany) under the vague mistaken impression that Ain’t She Sweet would be released as a single.
The Beatles returned to Liverpool in the summer of 1961. Sheridan stayed in Hamburg but as Lewisohn suggests, ‘his influence on The Beatles would endure’. That said, they were not entirely unhappy to be leaving the more brutal aspects of the Sheridan Academy in the rear mirror.
In September of the same year, record store owner Brian Epstein began receiving customer requests for an obscure German release called My Bonnie by Tony Sheridan and The Beat Brothers. He decided to investigate and in November went to see these ‘Beat Brothers’ at a club called The Cavern, just around the corner from his shop
After their final Hamburg residency in 1962, Tony Sheridan would be forever linked to those of his ‘pupils’.
His later career moves were as unpredictable as his set lists. The most dramatic was a period of militant anti-communism, which found him joining the US army in Vietnam. At one point he was declared MIA, before he eventually reappeared in Germany.
In his final years, he became an avuncular guide his old Hamburg haunts — this mini-documentary provides a fascinating insight into an important but often overlooked character in the The Beatles story.
Tony Sheridan 1940–2013 — Sheridan tells his story for RTE here
Right then, Brian — Manage Us! * Who were John Lennon’s parents?
