50 Years Ago

On July 6, 1957, Paul McCartney was introduced to John Lennon and invited the 16-year-old to join his band.

If this seems like a trivial detail to you, take a moment to imagine your music collection, your neighborhood record store, the printed lyrics in your CD booklets, the concept of an album as an artistic statement, music videos, tape looping, orchestrated pop songs, popular music as an artistic statement, impromptu rooftop concerts, recorded feedback, your favorite band on a late-night talk show, and stadium concerts.

Then, try to imagine a world without them.

More on their meeting here. Here's a list of who wrote which song in the Beatles oeuvre.

A more extensive account of the Lennon/McCartney introduction is given in Bob Spitz's biography of the band, the best, and most comprehensive, book on the Beatles I've ever read.