"Beatles at Barnum" recalls an age of revolution

Guitars were anything but weeping at the "Beatles at Barnum" concert put on by the Samo Orchestras as a fundraiser for the third year in a row. Father Knows Best, a local band made up of fathers with children in the orchestra program, played through some of the many enduring Beatles hits with orchestra accompaniment, and the event helped to raise money for the Orchestra Program’s different events during the year.Scott Ferguson, the lead guitarist and vocalist in Father Knows Best, remembers when the “Beatle Bug” hit the United States.

“They were a big sensation in England. And right after Christmas, with ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’ we all heard about them," Ferguson said. "They were on the Ed Sullivan Show for three weeks in a row.”

It was the 1960s, a time of rapid change and rebellion, and the Beatles were changing the musical landscape by fusing musical ideas from different parts of the world.

“There were things that they brought which nobody had done before they did it," Ferguson said. "They took the R&B they heard from America, and they had that sort of groove and back beat, boy-girl kind of things, and they put the Irish music that was native to their own people into that formula. So you had this kind of drive and at the same time that kind of lilt.”

Beatles music remains relevant among young people today, even those who didn’t grow up listening to their music.

“I did not grow up listening to Beatles music, but I thoroughly enjoyed the concert,” Henry Felstiner (‘16) said. “I think the incorporation of the orchestra into the timeless music of the Beatles, added a unique touch unrivaled by any other sound.”