Lennon letter denying 'rip off' sold for $35,000

A letter from John Lennon denying that the Beatles "ripped off" black music fetched £12,000 (NZ$35,400) at auction yesterday.

Dashed off on a piece of "American Airlines" headed notepaper, the letter was a response to a newspaper article accusing the Beatles of imitating and exploiting American black music in their early cover records.

Clearly upset by the suggestion, Lennon, a prolific letter writer, responded to the charges made by journalist Craig McGregor in a piece for the New York Times.

McGregor, who at the time was living in East Sussex, but has since moved to Australia, put the letter up for sale at Bonham's auction house in London, together with a photocopy of his article and a carbon copy of his reply to Lennon, which remained unanswered.

In his letter, Lennon described how the Beatles and their contemporaries were inspired by American black music and never tried to conceal their debt to it.

He insisted, "It wasn't a rip off. It was a love in."

Lennon explained that the Beatles used to perform cover versions of songs including "Money", "Twist and Shout" and "You Really Got A Hold On Me" in dancehalls early in their career because they did not consider their own material to be of sufficiently high quality.

"It was only natural that we tried to do it as near to the record as we could - I always wish we could have done them close to the originals," Lennon wrote.

"We didn't sing our own songs in the early days - they weren't good enough - the one thing we always did was to make it known that there were black originals.

We loved the music and wanted to spread it in any way we could," he added poignantly.

"People like - Eric Burdons Animals - Micks Stones - and us drank, ate and slept the music, and also recorded it, many kids were turned on to the music by us [sic]."

Stephen Maycock, a consultant specialist at Bonhams, said: "John and the other Beatles have spoken at great length in interviews about themselves and the early days, but it's quite unusual to find a document written about the group's beginnings by one of the members."

"It's a nice summary of John's opinions. He was quite stung by the accusation that the Beatles were ripping off black musicians and making all the money while the black artists remained penniless and obscure.

"It's what the Beatles cut their teeth on. As John says, in the early days, instead of playing their own substandard compositions, they played covers of wonderful music by black artists.

"They were doing their bit to promote black music in Britain. A lot of these records were coming into the country via Liverpool, which was a very busy port."

Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Ray Charles and Mary Wells, who went on tour with the Beatles, were important influences on the group.

Lennon has admitted the influence of black music on the Beatles' songs.

Two years ago, the South Bank Show made a programme about a juke box, which belonged to John Lennon in the mid-1960s.

Director Chris Walker said: "In Lennon's juke box there were R&B, Motown and soul records, but not much rock and roll."

The ITV arts programme played a tape recording in which Lennon confessed that the Beatles lifted the opening guitar lick to "I Feel Fine" from black artist Bobby Parker's "Watch Your Step".

Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison were all keen letter writers, dating back to their early career in Hamburg, when they kept in touch with girl fans in the UK by writing to them.

A black felt hat decorated with six metal discs worn by Lennon on the last official Beatles photo shoot at Tittenhurst Park in August 1969, two days after their final recording session, was also included in the auction of rock and roll memorabilia, but failed to sell.

- INDEPENDENT