The Beatles attending a press conference at Maple Leaf Gardens prior to their concert.Fred Ross/The Globe and Mail
Help them if you can. The Canadian-based OVOW Communications, with the green light from Apple Corps, is soliciting stories and archival material from the Beatles' touring years, 1963 to 1966.
Gathered material will contribute to The Beatles Live!, a film project that will use crowd-sourced concert memories, home movies, photos and sound recordings to chronicle the Fab Four in their twistiest and shoutiest days. A comprehensive website (thebeatlesliveproject.com) is up and running to aid in the search for material.
The mop-topped troupe gave six concerts in Canada all told. So, if you saw them standing there at Vancouver's Empire Stadium in 1964, perhaps you have 8-millimetre evidence. Was that you, madam, screaming your face off at the Montreal Forum later the same year? If so (and assuming you've since regained your composure), send in a digital file of a snapshot taken. And if were you one of the lucky ones who secured seats to the group's final Canadian concert at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto in 1966, possibly you have a bootleg recording of the only George Harrison tune on the set list. The song is If I Needed Someone, and now, after all these years, you are the someone needed.
Brad Wheeler