A Pilgrimage to Liverpool (Elizabeth Baas)

I have always loved music, whether listening, singing, or playing. For the past year I’ve listened to a lot of Beatles, and it turns out they were my most listened to artist of 2018. One might understand then how excited I was to discover the first day trip from York was to Liverpool.

For me, the trip was almost a pilgrimage. It started last January when I took the interim class, "Beatles and the ‘60s: Music and More." Before the class I had heard some songs from the Beatles, and had some sense of their stardom, but otherwise I was generally clueless about the group’s history. As the month of interim progressed, I came to know four of the most influential people in music history. I finally understood the intensity of ‘Beatlemania’ and how much the ‘60s changed music. Last January I fell in love with the music and the story of John, Paul, George, and Ringo. Since then, I’ve devoured the albums, remastered editions, and every compilation I could find.

I was ready for the two-hour trip to Liverpool with a playlist of my favorite Beatles tracks, and on the scenic bus ride there, I thought about how I would finally be visiting the port town that started it all. I would walk the streets that the Fab Four walked and see the sights they saw.

When we arrived in Liverpool, I was struck by how much it reminded me of Grand Rapids. Liverpool is a bit bigger, but it has the feeling of a city that once bustled with industry and commerce and now has new life being breathed into it. It’s a city in renewal, a lot like Grand Rapids. Undoubtedly, Liverpool has changed since the mid-twentieth century when the Beatles were growing up, but it occurred to me that the Beatles came from a city that’s not wholly different from my own.

The rebuilt Cavern Club stage at The Beatles Story

The Beatles Story was our first stop in Liverpool. The museum takes the visitor through the history of the Beatles, starting from the beginning, with one of Paul’s first guitars, to the costumes worn on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, one of the group’s later albums, and the lives of the band members post-Beatles. I was able to step through the recreated streets of Hamburg where the band spent hundreds of hours performing, stand in the Cavern Club, and board the Yellow Submarine. I didn’t think I could learn much more about one of my favorite bands, but as I worked my way through the museum, I kept learning new things, and it turns out I didn’t know the band as well as I thought I did.

I discovered one of the first places that the band played even before the Cavern Club was the Casbah Coffee Club, and that George helped to form a group after the Beatles called the Travelling Wilburys which included Roy Orbison, Jeff Lynne, Bob Dylan, and Tom Petty. I was also reminded of things I had forgotten, such as Ringo was the narrator for Thomas the Tank Engine, a fact that somehow always surprises.

Inside the Yellow Submarine

Though The Beatles Story was a fantastic place to visit, it isn’t the only destination in Liverpool for a Beatles fan. I didn’t get a chance to see places like Penny Lane, the rebuilt Cavern Club, or Strawberry Field, all of which are central in the Beatles’ story. I was disappointed that these places weren’t on the itinerary, but this led to an important realization:

There will always be more to learn about the Beatles. Whether information or places, there’s always more for me to see, visit, or learn. This realization also applies more broadly to my time in York. As the days go on, I feel less like a tourist and a bit more like a native, but I could spend the rest of my life here, and the city would still have things to surprise me with.

As I get to know York better, I hope the surprises are endless, just as they have been with the Beatles’ story.

Exact recreations of the costumes seen on the cover of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band