Radio: Pop Go The Beatles – 2 July 1963

Tuesday 2 July 1963 | Radio | BBC Maida Vale Studios, Studio Five, London, England

On Tuesday 2 July 1963, The Beatles returned to BBC Maida Vale Studios in London to record the fifth edition of Pop Go The Beatles — and the first in a newly commissioned run of eleven shows. The BBC had originally ordered just four editions. The audience response had been immediate and overwhelming. By the time The Beatles arrived at Studio Five on 2 July, the corporation had already decided it wanted more.

Rehearsals and recording took place between 6.30 and 9.30pm. The session produced nine songs, though only six would be broadcast. A new presenter, Rodney Burke, had replaced Lee Peters for this extended run. The guests were Duffy Power with the Graham Bond Quartet. The programme was broadcast on the BBC Light Programme on Tuesday 16 July 1963, from 5 to 5.30pm.

Pop Go The Beatles: The Extended Commission

Pop Go The Beatles had launched on 4 June 1963 as a four-part series — a modest commission for what the BBC assumed would be a routine pop programme. The format was simple: 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 initially presented by Lee Peters.

What the BBC had not fully anticipated was the scale of the audience response. By the time the fourth edition aired in late June 1963, it was clear that Pop Go The Beatles was not a routine pop programme. It was a document of the most important cultural phenomenon in British music — and the audience knew it. The BBC commissioned a further eleven editions, extending the run through to September 1963.

The 2 July session was the first recording of this new run. It marked a small but significant change: Rodney Burke replaced Lee Peters as presenter, a shift that gave the extended series a slightly different character. Burke was a BBC staff announcer and presenter who brought a more formal radio manner to the show — a contrast with The Beatles' own irreverent wit that, if anything, made the group's natural charisma more apparent.

In total, Pop Go The Beatles ran to fifteen editions, broadcast between 4 June and 24 September 1963. It remains one of the most important documents of early Beatlemania in the BBC archive — a series that captured the group at the precise moment when they were becoming the biggest act in Britain, performing with a rawness and immediacy that the studio recordings, for all their brilliance, sometimes lack.

The Session: Nine Songs at Studio Five

The Beatles worked through nine songs during the 2 July session, though only six were used in the broadcast. The three unused recordings — Three Cool Cats, Sweet Little Sixteen, and Ask Me Why — were set aside, a common practice in BBC sessions where more material was recorded than the half-hour format could accommodate.

The six songs that were broadcast represent a characteristic cross-section of The Beatles' 1963 repertoire: American rock and roll covers that had formed the backbone of their live set since the Hamburg years, alongside original compositions that were beginning to demonstrate the range and ambition of the Lennon-McCartney partnership.

• That's All Right (Mama) — Arthur Crudup's 1946 blues original, made famous by Elvis Presley's 1954 Sun Records debut. The Beatles had been performing it since the early 1960s, and it remained a live staple — a direct line back to the American rock and roll that had first electrified them as teenagers in Liverpool.
• There's A Place — a Lennon-McCartney original from the Please Please Me album sessions, notable for its introspective lyric and the close vocal harmony between Lennon and McCartney. One of the earliest Beatles originals to explore inner emotional life rather than straightforward romance.
• Carol — Chuck Berry's 1958 original, a driving rock and roll number that The Beatles had been performing since the early Cavern days. Berry's influence on the group's guitar style and rhythmic approach was foundational, and Carol was one of the most direct expressions of that debt.
• Soldier Of Love (Lay Down Your Arms) — a 1962 American R&B original by Arthur Alexander, performed by John Lennon. Alexander was a significant influence on the early Beatles: his Anna (Go To Him) and A Shot Of Rhythm And Blues were also part of their BBC repertoire, and his blend of country, soul, and R&B mapped closely onto the group's own eclectic tastes.
• Lend Me Your Comb — a Carl Perkins original, performed as a Lennon-McCartney duet. Perkins was another foundational influence: his Matchbox and Honey Don't were also Beatles staples, and his rockabilly style had been absorbed into the group's DNA during the Hamburg years.
• Clarabella — a 1956 original by The Jodimars, performed by Paul McCartney. A relatively obscure choice that demonstrates the breadth of The Beatles' record collection and their willingness to dig into American pop history for material that suited their live sound.

The three unused recordings — Three Cool Cats (a Leiber and Stoller original performed by George Harrison), Sweet Little Sixteen (Chuck Berry, performed by Lennon), and Ask Me Why (a Lennon-McCartney original) — were recorded but not broadcast. Their existence is documented, but no official release has confirmed whether they survive in the BBC archive.

The Surviving Recordings: Live At The BBC and Anthology 1

Four of the six broadcast recordings from the 2 July session have been officially released, making this one of the better-documented Pop Go The Beatles sessions in terms of surviving audio.

That's All Right (Mama), Carol, Soldier Of Love, and Clarabella were all included on Live At The BBC, released in November 1994. The double album was a landmark release — the first official collection of The Beatles' BBC recordings, drawing on sessions from 1962 to 1965 and giving fans their first authorised access to the group's radio performances. It reached number one in the UK and number three in the US, demonstrating that the appetite for Beatles archive material remained as strong as ever, three decades after the sessions were recorded.

Lend Me Your Comb has had a more extensive release history. It appeared on Anthology 1 in 1995 — the first volume of the three-part archival series that accompanied the Beatles Anthology documentary — and was also included on On Air – Live At The BBC Volume 2 in 2013, the companion album to the original Live At The BBC collection.

The status of There's A Place from this session is less clear: the song was recorded at Maida Vale on 2 July 1963, but the version most familiar from official releases derives from the Please Please Me album sessions at Abbey Road in February 1963. Whether the BBC version survives and has been released remains a matter for specialist discographers.

The Guests: Duffy Power with the Graham Bond Quartet

The guests on the fifth edition of Pop Go The Beatles were Duffy Power, accompanied by the Graham Bond Quartet — a pairing that places the 2 July 1963 session at an interesting intersection of British pop and the emerging R&B scene that would eventually produce the British blues boom of the mid-1960s.

Duffy Power was a London-born singer who had been signed to Fontana Records and was known for a raw, soulful vocal style that set him apart from the smoother pop acts of the early 1960s. He had recorded with producer Joe Meek and was regarded by many in the industry as a significant talent, though commercial success largely eluded him.

The Graham Bond Quartet — featuring Graham Bond on organ, alongside a rhythm section that at various points included Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker — was one of the most important groups in the development of British R&B. Bond's Hammond organ-driven sound was a direct precursor to the harder blues-rock that would emerge later in the decade, and the presence of Bruce and Baker in his band meant that the seeds of Cream were already being sown in the same rooms where The Beatles were recording their BBC sessions.

The contrast between the guests and the hosts on 2 July 1963 is instructive. The Beatles were the biggest act in Britain, riding the crest of Beatlemania with From Me To You at number one and Please Please Me dominating the album chart. Duffy Power and the Graham Bond Quartet were operating in a different, more underground world — one that would eventually produce some of the most significant music of the decade, but which in July 1963 was still finding its audience.

Maida Vale Studios: Studio Five

The 2 July session took place in Studio Five at BBC Maida Vale Studios — the same complex in Little Venice, west London, that had hosted the earlier Pop Go The Beatles sessions. Studio Five was one of the BBC's primary pop recording spaces, a room whose acoustic properties gave the BBC recordings their distinctive character: live and resonant, with a natural warmth that suited the group's sound in a way that differed noticeably from the more controlled environment of Abbey Road.

Maida Vale had been the BBC's primary music recording facility since the 1930s, converted from a former roller-skating rink into a complex of studios of varying sizes. The Beatles recorded there repeatedly between 1962 and 1965, and the building became one of the key locations in the geography of early Beatles history. The studios closed in 2020 after more than eight decades of continuous use.

Key Facts: 2 July 1963

• Date: Tuesday 2 July 1963
• Location: BBC Maida Vale Studios, Studio Five, London
• Recording times: 6.30–9.30pm
• Programme: Pop Go The Beatles, Edition 5
• Broadcast date: Tuesday 16 July 1963, 5–5.30pm, BBC Light Programme
• Presenter: Rodney Burke (replacing Lee Peters)
• Guests: Duffy Power with the Graham Bond Quartet
• Songs recorded (9): That's All Right (Mama), There's A Place, Carol, Soldier Of Love, Lend Me Your Comb, Clarabella, Three Cool Cats, Sweet Little Sixteen, Ask Me Why
• Songs broadcast (6): That's All Right (Mama), There's A Place, Carol, Soldier Of Love, Lend Me Your Comb, Clarabella
• Unused recordings (3): Three Cool Cats, Sweet Little Sixteen, Ask Me Why
• Official releases: That's All Right (Mama), Carol, Soldier Of Love, Clarabella — Live At The BBC (1994); Lend Me Your Comb — Anthology 1 (1995) and On Air – Live At The BBC Volume 2 (2013)

BBC Maida Vale Studios, Studio Five, Delaware Road, Little Venice, west London — the location for the 2 July 1963 Pop Go The Beatles session. The studios closed in 2020.

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