Monday 17 June 1963 | Radio | BBC Maida Vale Studios, London, England
On Monday 17 June 1963, The Beatles arrived at the BBC's Maida Vale Studios in London at 10.30am to record the fourth edition of Pop Go The Beatles — intended, at that point, to be the last. The initial run of the show had been commissioned for four editions. Nobody at the BBC had yet fully grasped what they had on their hands. They would work it out soon enough.
The session produced six recordings: I Saw Her Standing There, Anna (Go To Him), Boys, Chains, PS I Love You, and Twist And Shout. The half-hour programme was first broadcast on Tuesday 25 June 1963 from 5pm, with The Bachelors as guests. After the session, The Beatles ate in the BBC staff canteen with photographer Dezo Hoffman, went outside to Delaware Road for a photo session, and then returned to Liverpool.
Pop Go The Beatles: The Show
Pop Go The Beatles was a BBC Light Programme radio series that ran from June to September 1963, giving The Beatles their own dedicated radio show at the precise moment when Beatlemania was beginning to sweep Britain. The format was straightforward: The Beatles performed a set of songs, introduced the tracks themselves, and were joined by guest acts. The show was produced by Terry Henebery and presented by Lee Peters.
The initial commission was for four editions — of which this 17 June session was the last. But the audience response was immediate and overwhelming. The BBC, recognising that they had commissioned something rather more significant than a routine pop programme, extended the run. Pop Go The Beatles eventually ran to fifteen editions in total, broadcast between 4 June and 24 September 1963, making it one of the most important documents of early Beatlemania in the BBC archive.
The show's title was a pun on the nursery rhyme Pop Goes the Weasel — a piece of wordplay that captured the light, playful tone the BBC was aiming for, and which The Beatles themselves inhabited with characteristic ease. They were, by June 1963, extraordinarily comfortable in front of a microphone: the Hamburg residencies, the Cavern Club, and hundreds of live performances had given them a stage presence and a natural wit that translated perfectly to radio.
The Session: Six Songs at Maida Vale
The Beatles arrived at Maida Vale at 10.30am and worked through rehearsal and recording of six songs. The choice of material is a precise snapshot of their live and BBC repertoire in mid-1963 — a blend of original compositions and the American covers that had formed the backbone of their set since the Hamburg years.
- I Saw Her Standing There — the opening track of Please Please Me, a McCartney-led rocker that had been a live staple since 1962 and remained one of the most electrifying openers in their arsenal.
- Anna (Go To Him) — Arthur Alexander's 1962 R&B original, covered by Lennon with a tenderness that transformed it. It had appeared on Please Please Me and was a regular in their BBC sessions.
- Boys — the Shirelles' B-side, taken over by Ringo as his vocal showcase. A driving, joyful performance that the group had been playing since the early Cavern days.
- Chains — the Cookies' 1962 hit, sung by George Harrison. A deceptively simple song that Harrison delivered with quiet authority.
- PS I Love You — the B-side of Love Me Do, McCartney's gentle, slightly wistful love letter. The BBC version recorded on 17 June 1963 is the only known surviving BBC recording of the song, though it is known to have been performed at two 1962 BBC sessions as well.
- Twist And Shout — the Isley Brothers' 1962 original, taken to its absolute limit by Lennon in a single take at the Please Please Me album session in February 1963. The BBC version would have been no less ferocious.
Six songs. Two hours of rehearsal and recording. A morning's work that produced material that would still be listened to sixty years later.
The Surviving Recordings: Baby It's You, On Air, and the Archive
Not all BBC recordings survive. The BBC's practice of wiping and reusing tapes — standard procedure for decades, and a source of considerable anguish to music historians — means that many of The Beatles' radio performances exist only in documentation rather than in audio. The 17 June session is a partial exception: three of the six recordings survive.
Boys was released on the Baby It's You EP in 1995 — a four-track release that accompanied the first volume of the Beatles Anthology and gave fans their first official access to BBC-era recordings. The EP's title track, Baby It's You, was from a different BBC session, but Boys from 17 June 1963 was included alongside it.
Chains and PS I Love You were both included on On Air – Live At The BBC Volume 2, released in 2013. The double album collected BBC recordings from across the group's radio career and was the companion to the original Live At The BBC (1994), which had itself been a landmark release — the first official collection of The Beatles' BBC recordings, drawing on sessions from 1962 to 1965.
The PS I Love You recording from this session carries a particular significance: it is the only known surviving BBC version of the song. The group performed it at two 1962 BBC sessions, but those recordings have not survived. The 17 June 1963 version is therefore the sole audio evidence of how The Beatles performed this song for the BBC — a fragile, irreplaceable document.
The Guests: The Bachelors
The guests on the fourth edition of Pop Go The Beatles, broadcast on 25 June 1963, were The Bachelors — an Irish vocal harmony trio from Dublin who had been signed to Decca Records and were enjoying considerable commercial success in the early 1960s with a series of easy-listening pop hits. Their presence on a Beatles programme in June 1963 is a reminder of how broad the BBC's conception of pop music was at the time: The Bachelors and The Beatles occupied very different sonic worlds, but both were part of the same commercial landscape.
The Bachelors would go on to have a string of UK hits throughout 1963 and 1964, including Charmaine, Diane, and I Believe. They were, in their own way, a significant act — but the contrast with The Beatles, who were in the process of redefining what British pop music could be, was considerable.
Dezo Hoffman and the Canteen Lunch
After the recording session, The Beatles ate in the BBC staff canteen — accompanied by photographer Dezo Hoffman, who had been photographing the session and continued to document the afternoon. Hoffman was one of the most important photographers of the early Beatles era: a Czech-born photojournalist who had settled in London and become one of the group's most trusted lensmen, producing some of the most iconic images of the group in 1963 and 1964.
The canteen lunch is a detail that humanises the day. The Beatles in June 1963 were the biggest act in Britain — From Me To You was at number one, Please Please Me had been at the top of the album chart for months — and yet here they were, eating in a BBC staff canteen like any other visiting act, with a photographer documenting the moment. It is the kind of detail that Hoffman specialised in: the ordinary within the extraordinary, the human beings inside the phenomenon.
After lunch, the group went outside to Delaware Road — the street adjacent to the Maida Vale Studios — for a separate photo session with Hoffman. The images from that afternoon session are among the most relaxed and natural photographs of the group from this period: four young men on a London street in June, between a radio recording and a drive back to Liverpool, caught in the brief pause between one thing and the next.
Maida Vale Studios: The BBC's Music Home
The BBC's Maida Vale Studios in Little Venice, west London, had been the corporation's primary music recording facility since the 1930s. The complex — converted from a former roller-skating rink — housed multiple studios of varying sizes, and was the location for a significant proportion of The Beatles' BBC radio recordings between 1962 and 1965.
Maida Vale's Studio 5, in particular, was the room where many of the most important BBC pop recordings of the 1960s were made. The acoustic properties of the studios — live and resonant, with a natural warmth that suited both orchestral and pop recording — gave the BBC recordings a distinctive sound that differs noticeably from the more controlled environment of Abbey Road. The Beatles' BBC performances have a rawness and immediacy that the studio recordings, for all their brilliance, sometimes lack.
The BBC announced in 2018 that Maida Vale Studios would close, with operations transferring to a new facility. The studios closed in 2020 after more than eight decades of continuous use. The building has since been sold for residential conversion — another piece of music history absorbed into London's relentless property market.
Key Facts: 17 June 1963
- Date: Monday 17 June 1963
- Location: BBC Maida Vale Studios, London
- Arrival time: 10.30am
- Programme: Pop Go The Beatles, Edition 4
- Broadcast date: Tuesday 25 June 1963, 5pm, BBC Light Programme
- Duration: 30 minutes
- Guests: The Bachelors
- Songs recorded: I Saw Her Standing There, Anna (Go To Him), Boys, Chains, PS I Love You, Twist And Shout
- Surviving recordings: Boys (released 1995, Baby It's You EP); Chains and PS I Love You (released 2013, On Air – Live At The BBC Volume 2)
- Only surviving BBC version: PS I Love You
- Photographer present: Dezo Hoffman
- Post-session: Canteen lunch; photo session on Delaware Road; return to Liverpool
- Total series run: 15 editions, 4 June – 24 September 1963
BBC Maida Vale Studios on Delaware Road in Little Venice, west London — the location for the 17 June 1963 Pop Go The Beatles session, and for many of The Beatles' most important BBC radio recordings between 1962 and 1965. The studios closed in 2020.
The Beatles: Please Please Me Era
Every song recorded at Maida Vale on 17 June 1963 came from the world of Please Please Me — the album that started everything.
Frequently Asked Questions
What was Pop Go The Beatles?
Pop Go The Beatles was a BBC Light Programme radio series that gave The Beatles their own dedicated radio show in 1963. It ran for fifteen editions between 4 June and 24 September 1963, with The Beatles recording a set of songs for each edition at BBC studios. The show was initially commissioned for four editions before being extended due to its popularity.
What songs did The Beatles record for Pop Go The Beatles on 17 June 1963?
The Beatles recorded six songs at BBC Maida Vale Studios on 17 June 1963: I Saw Her Standing There, Anna (Go To Him), Boys, Chains, PS I Love You, and Twist And Shout. The session was for the fourth edition of Pop Go The Beatles, broadcast on 25 June 1963.
Which recordings from the 17 June 1963 session have been officially released?
Three recordings from the session have been officially released: Boys (on the Baby It's You EP, 1995), and Chains and PS I Love You (on On Air – Live At The BBC Volume 2, 2013). The PS I Love You recording is the only known surviving BBC version of that song.
Where were the Pop Go The Beatles sessions recorded?
The 17 June 1963 session was recorded at BBC Maida Vale Studios on Delaware Road in Little Venice, west London — the BBC's primary music recording facility and the location for many of The Beatles' BBC radio recordings between 1962 and 1965. The studios closed in 2020.
Who was Dezo Hoffman?
Dezo Hoffman was a Czech-born photojournalist based in London who became one of The Beatles' most trusted photographers in 1963 and 1964. He photographed the 17 June 1963 Pop Go The Beatles session at Maida Vale and the subsequent photo session on Delaware Road, producing some of the most relaxed and natural images of the group from this period.
When was the fourth edition of Pop Go The Beatles broadcast?
The fourth edition of Pop Go The Beatles, recorded on 17 June 1963, was first broadcast on Tuesday 25 June 1963 from 5pm on the BBC Light Programme. It ran for thirty minutes and featured The Bachelors as guests.
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