The English ROCK MUSIC group The Beatles gave the 1960s its distinctive musical flavor and had a profound influence on the course of popular music, equaled by few artists. The guitarists John Winston Lennon, n.Oct. 9, 1940; James Paul McCartney, b. June 18, 1942; and George Harrison, b. February 25, 1943; and drummer Ringo Starr, n. Richard Starkey, 7 July 1940, all born and raised in Liverpool. Lennon and McCartney had played together in a band called The Quarrymen. With Harrison they formed their own group, The Silver Beatles, in 1959, and Starr joined them in 1962. As the Beatles, they developed a local following in Liverpool clubs, and their first recordings, "Love Me Do" (1962) and "Please Please Me" (1963), quickly made them Britain's biggest rock band. Their early music was influenced by American rock singers Chuck BERRY and Elvis PRESLEY, but they infused a banal musical form with freshness, vitality and spirit. The release of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" in 1964 marked the beginning of the phenomenon known as "Beatlemania" in the United States. The Beatles' first American tour drew universal adulation from the crowd. Their concerts were scenes of mass worship and their records sold by the millions. Their first film, the groundbreaking A Hard Day's Night (1964), was enthusiastically received by a wide audience that included many who had never heard rock music before. By composing their own material (Lennon and McCartney were the main creative forces), the Beatles set the precedent for other rock groups to play their own music. Experimenting with new musical forms, they produced an extraordinary variety of songs: the very simple "Yellow Submarine"; the bitter social criticism of "Eleanor Rigby"; parodies of early pop styles; new electronic sounds; and compositions written for cellos, violins, trumpets, and sitars, as well as conventional guitars and drums. Some enthusiasts cite the albums Rubber Soul (1965) and Revolver (1966) as the pinnacle of the Beatles' artistry, although Sergeant Pepper's LonelyHearts Club Band (1967), perhaps the first rock album conceived thematically as a single musical entity , is more generally considered their triumph. The group disbanded in 1970, after the release of their last album, Let It Be, and embarked on an individual career in the 1970s. On December 8, 1980, John Lennon was shot and killed outside his Manhattan apartment by Mark Chapman, a 25-year-old former mental patient who, earlier that day, had asked Lennon for his autograph. Lennon's murder was universally mourned with an intensity of feeling usually inspired only by political and spiritual leaders. Bibliography: The Beatles complete, 2