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I know being interviewed by Barbara Walters was considered a great honor, but I think she did Ringo dirty on this interview, as she talked to him about John. It had only been 3 short months since he was murdered and obviously Ringo emotions were very raw.
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George has a press conference with Madonna. I think one of George's biggest regrets in life was doing a movie with Madonna and Sean Penn. Too much drama for George!
George Harrison Talks about the Indian Sound (1966)
By Sean O'Mahony
Beat Instrumental
March 1966
Just before George Harrison took off for Barbados with Pattie for their delayed honeymoon, he talked to me about the Beatles. Thinking of future trends in the pop music sphere, his use of a sitar on the backing track of "Norwegian Wood" and his newfound interest in Indian music have received a lot of comment recently.
The Beatles, of course, are not the only ones to mention the music of the subcontinent in pop terms; many devotees like Decca's Tony Hall and Donovan are reputedly knocked out by the playing of gentlemen like Ravi Shankar.
When I talked to George, he was sitting on the wooden block floor of his music room in his home in Esher, nursing his sitar. All the room contains is a wall hung with guitars and a small jukebox. There aren't many Beatles titles on the list of records either. As George explained, he had to sit cross-legged on the floor because it was impossible to play the sitar any other way. Its long neck and heavy bowl make it almost impossible to play standing up, unless you rest the bowl on a table or something to support it. The equivalent of frets on this instrument are brass ring-like pieces which are fixed onto the neck, but compared with an ordinary guitar as we know it, they seem to be much scarcer, with the result that you have to play the instrument rather like a cross between a violin and a guitar to find the intermediate notes between the frets.
I couldn't resist asking George whether he thought this type of music would catch on. "I wouldn't be at all surprised if one day, when we are a lot older, our kids walk into the room and put some records on, which will be based on this type of music," he replied. "Maybe we will turn around and say, 'What the hell is that noise?'"
"Isn't the Indian music scale different from ours? "I asked him. "Yes, it is different," George agreed. "In actual fact, it is far more complicated than the one we use. We think that Indian music has a lot of weird sounds in it. It doesn't sound right to our ears because we aren't used to it. In fact, to my mind, it's much more advanced than our scale.
"It does sound a bit distorted, but you have got to remember that a lot of the most interesting noises on top discs today are based on distortion. Jeff Beck, for example, gets some fabulous sounds by moving his guitar in front of his amp to create feedback." George returned to his sitar, but somehow I don't think we will see the Beatles sitting cross-legged on stage playing Indian instruments.
By Felicity McCormick
Yorkshire Post
March 5, 1996
"Can't Buy Me Love" sang the Beatles 32 years ago, and yesterday proved they were not just empty words. For the love of John, Paul, George, and Ringo have turned down a £147 million offer to perform live on a world tour as the Threetles. It would have been the first time the Beatles had performed live for 30 years, and the first time they had been together on stage without John Lennon, who was murdered in 1980.
But to Paul McCartney, "The size of the offer is scandalous. It's ridiculous, from a money point of view, most people would do it. But to me, the three of us isn't as exciting as the four of us. The Beatles were always the four of us. Of course, people will say that we could get someone else to fill John's place, but it just wouldn't be the same."
A Beatles aide said, "Talk about real love. They have such love for John that they won't play with anyone else, even for a paycheck of $75 million each."
The 22-night tour of America, Japan, and Europe, proposed by a consortium of German and American businessmen, would have seen Paul, George, and Ringo back on the road this summer, but they have always resisted offers to reform after their split at the end of the 60s, and they can hardly be said to need the money.
Paul has an estimated £580 million with shares in the Beatles' two main companies, Apple Corps and Maclen Music. George Harrison has been rumored to be down to his last few million, but he still owns a quarter of Apple, or £75 million, and another £10 million through Maclen. As for Ringo Starr, he has a quarter share in Apple and a fortune estimated at £30 million, much of it in offshore accounts.
If you are curious about these photos -- then feel free to read the story that goes along with them about the fan named Cindy who won a contest to meet Ringo and gift him a door.
https://www.meetthebeatlesforreal.com/2016/01/a-personal-meeting-with-ringo.html
