In all, the Beatles visited Hamburg on
five occasions.

  Their first visit began on the 16th
August, 1960. On this occasion they made
a demo disc but this led nowhere and only
five copies were made. The clubs they
performed at were the Indra and the
Kaiserkeller.

  Their second visit was on the 27th
March, 1961. This time they made their
first official record. It was as a backing
group for Tony Sheridan who was a major
star in Germany at that time. It was felt
that the name Beatles would be
confusing to the Germans so on the
record they were known as the Beat
Brothers. The record was “My Bonnie”,
backed by “When the Saints Go
Marching In”. Only four of the group
featured on it because by then Stuart had
left. On this visit they performed for
fourteen weeks at the Top Ten Club.

  The third visit was on the 13th April,
1962. Seven weeks at Hamburg's plush
new nightclub—Star Club.

  The fourth visit was on the 1st
November, 1962. Two weeks at the Star Club.

  The fifth and final visit of this period
started on the 18th December, 1962. This
was for two weeks but this time they
didn't want to go as their recent record
success had meant they were going to
miss out on TV and radio appearances,
but as they were under contract they
performed once more, as agreed, at the
Star Club.

In 1977, despite
attempts by the
Beatles to
prevent it, a
double album of
the band
performing live
was released.
They had
been
recorded on
a Grundig
tape recorder,
with a hand held
microphone, at the
request of Ted ‘Kingsize’ Taylor at a show
in the Star Club in 1962. He had wanted
his own band, the Dominoes, recorded
but also on the same bill were the Beatles
and Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers.
Ted Taylor offered the tapes to Brian
Epstein who offered him only ￡20, saying
they had no commercial value. Many
years later the tape were discovered
stored away in an old office. Again the
Beatles were approached to buy the
tapes but this was at the time of the
financial difficulties at Apple. So after
being turned down, Allan Williams who
was by now handling the deal, sold the
tapes to Paul Murphy, head of BUK
Records. They were cleaned up using
more modern recording techniques and
eventually released in Britain on the
Lingasong Label under the name:

“The Beatles Live! At the Star Club in
Hamburg, Germany 1962”