What was The Beatles final concert?
The last time The Beatles played together for an audience was in the famous rooftop performance in January 1969. This was not, however, a concert in the conventional sense, with tickets available to the public.
August 29th, 1966 — Candlestick Park in San Francisco
The Beatles’ last ever US date proved a downbeat occasion. It was held in the Giants stadium, a particularly unsuitable venue. A huge fence separated the crowd from the band and there were chaotic dressing room arrangements. Despite the continuing popularity of the band, only 25,000 of the 42,000 seats were sold — partly because of high prices.
The disconnect between young fans and now forbiddingly remote idols is made apparent by concert’s compere ‘Emperor’ Gene Nelson:
Candlestick Park in August, at night, was cold, foggy and windy. …The Beatles were taking their time to get out. I was trying to entertain a crowd that was shouting, ‘Beatles, Beatles, Beatles.’
The dressing room was chaos. There were loads of people there. The press tried to get passes for their kids and the singer Joan Baez was in there. Any local celebrity, who was in town, was in the dressing room. They were having a party in there. They were having a perfectly wonderful time
Last straw?
The ‘they’ in this case was not The Beatles themselves, who had grown weary of backstage schmoozing. It seems they had already decided that this would be their last concert, as they took cameras and a cassette recorder (!) on stage to record momentos
No final decision had been made but John and George were thoroughly disillusioned with Beatlemania. Paul and Ringo argued more for ‘a rest’ but were to exhausted to press their case.
