July 11: "The Beatles: Band of the Sixties" at the Rogers Memorial Library

Ringo Starr gets no love.

Fifty years after The Beatles peaked in popularity, their music remains in high esteem and references to the band are common and usually flattering. But references to Ringo specifically tend to be rather less flattering.

In Season 3, Episode 7 of Breaking Bad, Walter White enters a hospital room to visit his partner, Jesse Pinkman, who had recently been beaten unconscious. Walter finds him horribly bruised, with two black eyes (the left swollen shut). "You're now officially the cute one of the group," jokes lawyer Saul Goodman to Walt. "Paul meet Ringo. Ringo, Paul."

At the end of the 2014 film Jersey Boys, a biopic of The Four Seasons, band member Nicky addresses the question of why the group broke up: "It could have been an ego thing. Everybody wants to be up front. But if there's four guys, and you're Ringo? Better I should spend some time with my kids."

And in the 2003 film Love Actually, adolescent Sam struggles with romantic interests despite coaching and encouragement from his father, Daniel. In one scene, they brainstorm a plan:
     SAM: Girls love musicians, don't they?
     DANIEL: Uh-huh.
     SAM: Even the really weird ones get girlfriends.
     DANIEL: That's right. Meatloaf definitely got laid at least once. For God's sake, Ringo Starr married a Bond girl.
     SAM: Whatever.

Even John Lennon took potshots: "When I feel my head start to swell, I just look at Ringo and know we're not supermen." (Geoffrey Stokes' The Beatles, p. 102).

Ringo Starr gets no love.

In an effort to give Ringo long overdue credit, I put together a presentation highlighting his personality, drumming, singing, and songwriting. On 30 June 2015, I debuted Starr Time: A Celebration of Ringo Starr's Contributions To The Beatles at the Polk County Library in Bolivar, MO. In the audience was the librarian host, my dad, my grandma, and my grandma's half-sister. About half way through the hour-long presentation, another man walked in and stayed for the remainder. In other words, only one person not obligated to attend through either familial or professional commitment did so - and he was half an hour late.

Ringo Starr gets no love.

Discouraged but not defeated, I booked the program again. On 12 October 2015 I arrived at the LaGrange Association Library in Poughkeepsie, NY library with the hopes of drawing an audience closer to my average of 35. But this time the audience totaled zero.

Ringo Starr gets no love.

A couple weeks back I received an email from Peter Dean of www.KitePrint.com. He recreated the circus poster that inspired John Lennon's song 'Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite' from Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. He had found my BEATLES MINUTE video comparing the melodies of 'Mr. Kite' with 'It's Only Love' and expressed an interest in more such videos. I asked him if he might have suggestions for topics. He requested a video on Ringo to see why I hold him in such high regard. "I’ve always referred to Ringo as 'The luckiest man in the history of rock’n’roll'," he told me by email. "And, by extension, referred to George Martin as ‘the fourth Beatle'."

Ringo Starr gets no love.

And Peter isn't alone. Many Beatles fans dismiss him. And yet, Ringo was integral to The Beatles and their success. He might not have been the most technically skilled or flashiest percussionist, but for what that band needed at that time, they couldn't have found anybody better than Ringo.

So, in a further effort to illustrate why Ringo deserves respect and adulation comparable to that of his band mates, I set to work on a BEATLES MINUTE video all about Ringo. But I quickly discovered a major problem: There's no way to fit it all into one minute - there's just too much to discuss. (Maybe I should initiate THE BEATLES HOUR?) With so much information to consider and process, I've decided to start in blog format. This post, then, be the first of five analyzing his considerable skills as a drummer. If I get a lot of comments and interest, I might take highlights of these findings to create videos. But if there's little interest or support (as has been the case so far), then I probably won't create said videos.

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Ringo's drumming patterns fit into three basic categories:

1. Metronomic, in which every beat is the same.

2. The Rock Beat, in which the bass drum is hit on beats 1 and 3, and the snare hit on beats 2 and 4.

3. Syncopated, in which at least one beat is not articulated.

Where today is an introduction, tomorrow (July 11) I will discuss how Ringo uses metronomic drum patterns. On Tuesday (July 12), I will consider his use of The Rock Beat. On Wednesday (July 13) I will analyze his syncopated drumming. And on Thursday (July 14), I'll show how these differing beats can be combined within a single song.

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The course of this blog series on Ringo's drumming will coincide with a mini tour that starts tomorrow:
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Monday, 11 July 2016, 5:30-6:30 p.m.
Rogers Memorial Library, 91 Coopers Farm Rd, Southampton, NY
The Beatles: Band of the Sixties
Explore the music of The Beatles in this 60-minute multimedia presentation (part history and part musical analysis) spanning the full 1960's: beginning with the band's seminal visits to Hamburg, continuing through Beatlemania, and concluding with Abbey Road. The program will be supplemented with audio clips of music and excerpts from interviews with the band members.