Picture taken during the recent Paul McCartney concert in Syracuse that my son and I attended.
Today marks the big 81st birthday of Paul McCartney, who was born on June 18, 1942 in Liverpool, England.
He went on to have some modest success in his musical career.
Just lately, I have been thinking quite a bit about the free concert that he gave at the Plains of Abraham in Québec City for the 400th anniversary. I learned about it from my father and brother just weeks before it was supposed to take place. Not sure when it was announced, or how they even heard about it. But once I learned about it, I was pretty determined to go.
Arranging to be off from work (I worked on the weekends, and this concert took place on a Sunday night) took a little bit of juggling, but I managed. It wound up that neither my father nor my brother went, but my then wife and our son, who was not quite three years old yet at that point, when instead. It proved to be one of the most pleasant and memorable weekends of my adult life. The entire city was very excited about the concert. It was in every newspaper in the days leading up to the concert, and then, of course, the day of and the day after. I got a bunch of copies of those newspapers, and it is still cool to look at them from time to time, and remember just how nice that weekend was.
For the first time in a long time, I watched that concert recently on Youtube. So now, I thought that it might be good…
Picture of one of the stickers of this concert that I got years ago.
Fêtons Nos 400 Ans! - Ville de Québec
Hey Paul, you say it's your birthday?
Here is another short video from a concert that I actually was blessed enough to have attended, and which was like a life dream in music come true. This is a clip of Ringo Starr's 70th birthday concert at Radio City Music Hall, with Paul McCartney making a special guest appearance. McCartney was on base, Ringo was on drums, and it was touted as half of a Beatles reunion. It was as close as I'll ever get to actually having seen The Beatles as a band, and again, I felt extremely privileged to have seen such a thing in person!
And here is the entire concert!
Last year at around this time, my son and I went to see Paul McCartney in Syracuse. It was a great concert, and I felt blessed to have been able to go see that with my son. Actually, it was technically the third time that he and I saw him together, although he was too young to remember the first time in Quebec in 2008. However, we saw McCartney in Brooklyn back in September of 2017. You will never go to a bad McCartney show.
However, last night’s concert was particularly special. It came two days before his official birthday, and so there were celebrations. Two New Jersey natives came out to help Paul celebrate, with Jon Bon Jovi singing “Happy Birthday” to Paul. Earlier in the show, Bruce Springsteen making a special appearance and doing two songs with him. They sang “Glory Days” and “I Wanna Be Your Man.”
Bruce Springsteen joins Paul McCartney for 80th birthday surprise at MetLife Stadium by Chris Jordan of The Asbury Park Press, June 16, 2022:
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