Ringo Starr has been in the music business since 1960, the year he walked out of a factory in Liverpool and never looked back. That kind of longevity is rare enough. What is rarer still is arriving at the far end of six decades without, as he put it, losing your moorings. The question of how one of the most famous drummers alive kept his footing while so many others at the same height did not turns out to have a surprisingly simple answer: he was never alone.
Three mates who kept each other honest
Ringo credits the Beatles’ unusual staying power not to discipline or strategy but to the specific arithmetic of the group. Four men from the same city, equally invested, equally skeptical of each other. ‘If one of us would be freaking out or being a big shot, three other people would go, Excuse me?’ he said, and that mutual accountability kept all of them tethered to something real.
The contrast he draws is with Elvis Presley. The two crossed paths, and what Ringo remembered most was the loneliness of it. ‘How sad he’s on his own,’ he thought at the time. Elvis had an entourage, but no equals. Ringo had three great mates, and he understood even then that the difference mattered enormously.
That group instinct never really left him. When the All-Starr Band took shape, starting from a phone call that came out of nowhere through a promoter, a Pepsi sponsorship offer, and eventually his own lawyer, Ringo’s first move was to open the phone book and start calling friends. Dr. John, Joe Walsh, Billy Preston, Clarence Clemons, Nils Lofgren, Levon Helm. He wanted to bump up against Clarence, as he put it. The first lineup even had three drummers on stage at once, with Jim Keltner on one side and Levon Helm on the other, and Ringo in the middle, all three of them playing together.
Learning everything by playing, not by practicing
The origin story of Ringo as a drummer is less heroic than most fans might imagine, and he seems to prefer it that way. He tried practicing alone when he first got a kit set up in a back room and found it the most boring thing he had ever done. All his real learning happened with other musicians, in the middle of sets, at the edge of someone else’s gig.
It started with a snare drum and a set of brushes in a factory basement in Liverpool. His friend Rory had built a tea chest bass. A neighbor named Eddie Miles, a gifted guitarist who could pick up anything by ear, was nearby. Together they played for factory workers at lunchtime, and that improvised residency turned out to be Ringo’s actual conservatory.
By the time the Beatles came calling, he had refined his ear by listening to complete records rather than isolating individual instruments. He recalled sitting in a flat in London with Klaus Voormann and hearing an Al Green track, ‘I’m a Ram.’ The hi-hat pattern stopped him cold: boom boom boom, psst. Magic, he called it. Not technical study. Just the sound of a moment landing perfectly.
When Brian Epstein rang on a Wednesday to ask him to join the Beatles, Ringo said yes immediately and without regret, even though Rory Storm and the Hurricanes were the bigger act in Liverpool at the time. His only condition was that he could not start until Saturday, because the Hurricanes needed time to find another drummer. Loyalty to the people he was leaving, even on the way out.
The trumpet player who only knew one song
The one time Ringo tried to put a band together before the All-Starr years, around 1958, ended quickly. He heard about a trumpet player and invited him to rehearsal. The trumpet player did play trumpet. He could play exactly one song: ‘When the Saints Go Marching In.’ That band, Ringo noted with genuine amusement, fell apart really quick.
Sixty-some years later, he still plays every show from the center of the lineup, technically the leader of the All-Starr Band, practically just another member of a group of musicians who genuinely like each other. The tea chest bass and the factory basement are a long way behind him, but the logic is the same.
Words are not sufficient for explaining or describing The Beatles, and how they helped make the World A Better Place –
John Lennon | Paul McCartney | George Harrison | Ringo Starr
But ALWAYS remind yourself to Imagine, Believe, Achieve … And don’t forget the lessons of Yesterday 🙂
Yesterday is important, so Let it Be 😉
Hey Jude, remember Elanor Rigby is a lesson to never forget, and also critically essential that While My Guitar Gently Weeps we remember all of the whys In My Life every Now and Then … 😉 ✌️☮️❤️ Don’t miss Ringo Starr on The Beatles Secret to Success and The Beatles Final Rooftop Performance!
And WHEN you are occasionally down, don’t worry, Tomorrow is Another Day and…
