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Photo by  Fleur  on  Unsplash In March 1967 John and Paul were under pressure to produce the final tracks for Sergeant Pepper. They decided to have what would now be called a brainstorming session at John's house. According to Hunter Davies, this was a bewilderingly casual event in which they spent much of the time flicking through magazines. From time to time they would sing out phrases or pick out bits of tunes at the piano. Ian Macdonald speculates that there was some method at work in that 'both writers 'found inspiration in moments where their conscious minds had fallen into abeyance.' Whatever the strategy, it worked.  By the end of the day McCartney had a new song, 'The Fool on the Hill'. Lennon, meanwhile, plugged away at the chords to a tune with the working title Badfinger Boogie.  This reflection on on a minor injury would eventually became better known as 'With a Little Help From My Friends'

Contrary to Aunt Mimi’s later recollection, John Lennon was not born during an air-raid. On October 9, 1940, Liverpool was experiencing a brief respite from the intense bombing that had begun in August and would continue until January. The city would suffer 4,000 deaths, the highest number of casualties outside London . John Winston Lennon was delivered without incident at Liverpool Maternity Hospital. The shadow of the war was, of course, present at the birth. It was even there in that middle name. Winston was his mother’s patriotic tribute to Winston Churchill, Britain’s new Prime Minister. Taken from   Why was John Lennon brought up by his Aunt Mimi? (5 minute read) Download: The Beatles Teaching Pack   Only £3.99

  "I played a lot of harmonica & mouth organ when I was a child. We used to take in students and one of them had a mouth organ and said he’d buy me one if I could learn a tune by the next morning. So I learnt two." John Lennon John Lennon Remembers In 1947 Aunt Mimi began an arrangement with Liverpool University to take in students as lodger. One of these young men was Harold Phillips, who was resuming his studies after serving in the Royal Navy. The seven-year-old John was fascinated by a harmonica that Phillips possessed. Phillips was amused and offered the boy the chance to keep the 'mouth iron' - as it was known locally.  Harold Phillips kept his word - but Aunt Mimi made John wait until Christmas before taking possession of his first musical instrument. ‘I felt the stocking and there was a mouth organ in it. A harmonica.’ That was one of the great moments of my life, when I got my first harmonica’. Interestingly, the harmonica had been played by his father an