A lot of sitars

If you ever sat around and played the sitar in George Harrison AND Ravi Shankar's presence, then you are beyond cool!

Indian Birthday surprise

While looking online for something totally unrelated to the Beatles, I stumbled upon this little story about when it was Pattie Boyd's birthday in India in 1968.   It was written by the daughter of one of the men in the photo.   I have seen this photo (or one similar) before and I wondered who the English looking men were.  I assumed that they were fellow students at the Ashram, but now I know the truth.   Of course the story itself has some errors.   Of course the Beatles were working on "The White" album and not "Abbey Road."   I do not think there was a "official Beatles photographer"  with them in India.   I would guess that the photo was taken by Mal Evans.  

This is a picture of my father, Stephen Browne (far right), taken in Rishikesh in northern India with John Lennon, George Harrison and Pattie Boyd in 1968. He was on a gap year, teaching at two schools, before going to university.

The Beatles were in Rishikesh for much of that year, learning Transcendental Meditation with their guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and experimenting for their next album, which by my calculations might have been Abbey Road.

My father took up the dilruba (half sarangi, half sitar) while he was in India. On the day this was taken, his dilruba teacher had asked my father and his friend, Nick Nugent, whether they would like to come along to present an instrument to Pattie Boyd for her birthday. The picture was probably taken by the Beatles' official photographer.

This photograph is a prized family possession and is tinged with bittersweet emotion. A few years ago, when we lived in New York, my parents, siblings and I trudged through the snow to Kinko's copy shop on Christmas Eve to photocopy and scan the picture for safekeeping, and so that we could each have a copy.

Nobody remembers who was responsible for removing the original from the photocopying machine – but whoever it was forgot.

We returned to Kinko's on 78th Street many times over the next few days in the vain hope that somebody would hand it in, as they might have in the snowy, Christmassy New York of the movies, but they never did.

At least we're left with this facsimile. The dilruba is still in the attic. Malika Browne

Get your camera ready!

When I was young, in the 1980's and I knew that one of the Beatles was going to be on T.V., I would  get my VCR ready and make sure I had a tape all keyed up for the appearance.  But in the 1960's and 1970's fans didn't have the modern technology that we have today.   Not only was there not youtube to see the Beatles but there weren't VCRs in everyone homes.   If a Beatle was going to be on T.V. and you wanted to document it, then you would have to get your camera ready and aim it toward the television set to capture a photo.  

I recently obtained some George photos from a fan's scrapbook.   Included in that mix are these photos of George taken off a T.V. set from when he appeared on the Dick Cavett Show in 1971.  Who would have thought back then that this interview and performance would be available not only on home DVD but you can easily find it on the computer and watch it anytime you wish. 

Mia's photos

Big thank you goes out to Marcelo, who sent me the link for the auction (which ended last year) that sold these photos. These are amazing photographs! They were taken by Mia Farrow during the time in India in 1968. I especially enjoy the John Lennon photo. He looks so relaxed. Photos like these make me wonder just how many people have taken photos of the Beatles and have them sitting in their personal photo albums.