Hull New Theatre until 29th September 2018
Reviewed by Catherine McWilliams
4****
The Beatles provided the soundtrack for my childhood and then later as solo artists for my teens. So every song that was played last night brought back happy memories for me and I suspect for a lot of those in the audience.
Let It be is the concert that I never got the chance to see but is also a concert that in actuality never happened. When entering the theatre there were four large “old fashioned” television screens showing black and white news clips. They then played clips and radio clips from the early 1960s about the Beatles before Let It Be, the musicians, appeared on the stage to recreate the Beatles performance at the Royal Variety Performance. More news reel clips were followed by the performance at the Shea stadium, very cleverly staged with feedback from mikes, screaming fans and musicians clearly unable to hear themselves. The Sergeant Pepper era was then recreated with psychedelic backdrops and for Strawberry Fields Forever the gates of the Strawberry Field children’s home being projected as a backdrop. Finally before the interval we were taken to the roof of the Apple building for what was to be the Beatles final live performance. In the second half we were asked to imagine that the Beatles had got back together to play again on the occasion of John Lennon’s birthday in 1980. This “concert” had performances of the music from solo careers, some rock and roll and some Beatles favourites.
Emanuele Angeletti (Paul McCartney), John Brosnan (George Harrison), Ben Cullingworth (Ringo Starr) and Michael Gagliano (John Lennon) were all superb. Each is clearly a very talented musician and as a band they were very tight and together. Liverpudlian accents were a little wobbly at times but this didn’t matter as the music was the star. Michael Bramwell, the Musical Director provided very skillful musical support helping to create a wonderful sound. They very quickly had the theatre audience on their side and up on their feet and received a well-deserved standing ovation at the end. When the lights came up the majority of the audience remained on their feet applauding and clearly wanting more – a first for me!
This show has a real feel good factor and superb musicianship – you will come out with a huge smile on your face and singing a variety of Beatles songs!