The Top Ten Club was a music club in Hamburg's St. Pauli district at Reeperbahn 136, which opened on 31 October 1960 and kept its name until 1994.

In 1961, the Beatles performed 92 times at the Top Ten Club.

TheTop Ten Club
Former Top Ten Club, today moondoo

History

At the beginning of the 20th century, Reeperbahn 136 was the location of the Grand Hippodrom and Café of Carl Richter[1] Later it was called Hippodrom[2][3] and belonged, together with the bar, to Herbert Eckhorn.[4] In 1960, the heir to the hippodrome, Peter Eckhorn (* 12 February 1939 in Hamburg; † 19 May 1979), decided to close the hippodrome, rebuild it and reopen it with a new name as a music club.[5] The Top Ten Club was opened on 31 October 1960 by Peter Eckhorn and his manager Horst Fascher.[6] After disagreements, Peter Eckhorn separated from Horst Fascher shortly afterwards. Fascher then worked as a waiter in a restaurant in the Große Freiheit, where he persuaded Manfred Weissleder to turn the former Stern cinema into a music club, the Star-Club, becoming his manager.[7]

The Beatles

See also: The Beatles in Hamburg § The Top Ten
The Top Ten Club's former entrance on Reeperbahn (2011)

The Beatles, who until 31 December 1960 were under contract with Bruno Koschmider, the owner of Kaiserkeller, often visited Top Ten Club, where Tony Sheridan performed with his Jets. They also played together occasionally, which Bruno Koschmider found out about. On November 21, 1960 George Harrison was deported to England by the police, because at the age of 17 he was too young to work in a nightclub after midnight. It is assumed that it was Bruno Koschmider who tipped off the police because he was annoyed that the Beatles were unfaithful to him and wanted to switch to the Top Ten Club. Consequently, Harrison had to return to Liverpool.[8][9][10]

On 29 November 1960, Paul McCartney and Pete Best were arrested for attempted arson. They were said to have set fire to a condom when they packed their personal belongings in Bruno Koschmider's Bambi cinema, where they slept, to bring them to the Top Ten Club.[11] Best and McCartney spent three hours in the Davidwache Police Station, and were deported on 1 December 1960.[12] Lennon returned to Liverpool on 10 December, with Sutcliffe following in February 1961.[13]

Plaque on Beatles-Platz, commemorating the discovery of the Beatles and Sheridan in the Top Ten Club by Kaempfert and Schacht

The Beatles appeared back at the Top Ten Club with Tony Sheridan from 1 April 1 to 1 July 1961; together they performed there for 92 nights consecutively. They were to play a total of 503 hours on stage,[14] playing seven hours a night and eight hours at weekends, with a fifteen-minute pause every hour.[15] Each member of The Beatles was to be paid 35 deutschmarks.[16]

Peter Brüchmann [de] documented the Beatles' visit to the Top Ten Club in 1961, though his report did not appear in Quick until 1966.[17] Gerd Mingram [de] photographed the Beatles by chance when he commissioned a trade union newspaper in the Top Ten Club. Some of the photos were sold in the mid-seventies to Paul McCartney for £30,000.[18][better source needed]

Other bands

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Afterwards

Since 1994 there have been about ten changes of ownership, and the club name has changed just as often. The names adopted were: MC-Music Club,[21] new Top Ten Club, Soap Opera, The Irish Harp, La Cage[22] (1997 to 2001), Titty Twister (a name based on the bar Titty Twister in the film From Dusk Till Dawn, from 2002 to 2003),[23] Golden Stars (2003),[24] Glam (2003 to 2005)[25] and La Rocca (2005 to 2006).[26]

Since 2008 the name has been moondoo,[22] and the operator is "Lago Bay Betriebsgesellschaft mbH".[27]

In 1994, the London Club Dome, in Tufnell Park in the London Borough of Islington district, was transformed into the Top Ten Club for the film Backbeat.[28]

References

  1. ^ Grand Hippodrom, Inside view, Postcard from 1911
  2. ^ Postcard, Reeperbahn with Hippodrom
  3. ^ Postcard, Reeperbahn with Hippodrom, in 1955
  4. ^ Two Postcards of the Hippo-Klause (Inside view), Reeperbahn 136 (Hamburg-Bildarchiv.de, Reeperbahn) (click on the black numbers)
  5. ^ "Peter Eckhorn". IMDb. Retrieved 2020-04-19.
  6. ^ Hillman, Bill. "Top Ten Music Club (Quotations taken from The Beatles Anthology)". Hillmanweb. Retrieved 15 May 2009.
  7. ^ Harry, Bill. "A Man Called Horst - Mersey Beat". www.triumphpc.com. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
  8. ^ (The Beatles Anthology) DVD 2003 (Episode 1 - 0:49:56) Notice telling Harrison to leave Hamburg.
  9. ^ Lewisohn 1996, p. 24.
  10. ^ Miles 1997, pp. 72–73.
  11. ^ Spitz 2005, p. 230.
  12. ^ Hillman, Bill. "Early '60s ~ Part II: Digs (Quotations taken from The Beatles Anthology)". Hillmanweb. Retrieved 15 May 2009.
  13. ^ Lewisohn 1996, p. 25.
  14. ^ Lewisohn 1996, p. 42.
  15. ^ "Auf Spurensuche der BEATLES in Hamburg". www.wolfgangroehl.de (in German). 2012-10-24. Retrieved 2020-05-02.
  16. ^ Goldsmith, M. The Beatles Come to America, p. 64
  17. ^ Die kleinen Geheimnisse der Beatles, Quick, Nr. 28 vom 10. Juli 1966
  18. ^ "The Beatles At The Top Ten Club Signed Photograph by Gerd Mingram, | Lot #89205". Heritage Auctions. Retrieved 2020-09-01.
  19. ^ "The Jets, The Beatles And Hamburg". Archived from the original on 2020-01-17. Retrieved 2007-09-18.
  20. ^ Leonard, Deke (2000). Maybe I Should've Stayed in Bed? (1st ed.). Borden, Hants: Northdown Publishing Ltd. p. 62. ISBN 1-900711-09-5.
  21. ^ MC-Music Club in Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. 1994-04-09. p. 44.
  22. ^ a b "About moondoo". moondoo (in German). Retrieved 2020-05-18.
  23. ^ Rebaschus, Matthias (2003-01-30). "Titty Twister wird zum Golden Stars". www.abendblatt.de (in German). Retrieved 2020-05-18.
  24. ^ "Brave Art: Jens Maspfuhl". Wayback Machine. Archived from the original. 2014-05-03. Archived from the original on 2014-05-03. Retrieved 2020-05-18.((cite web)): CS1 maint: others (link)
  25. ^ "NACHTSCHICHT: "La Rocca" überrumpelt das Glam". MOPO.de (in German). 2005-10-04. Retrieved 2020-05-18.
  26. ^ "ABKEHR VON DER REEPERBAHN?: Verdrängt die wachsende Zahl der Discounter die Clubs vom Kiez?". MOPO.de (in German). 2007-01-25. Retrieved 2020-05-18.
  27. ^ "Data protection". moondoo (in German). Retrieved 2020-05-18.
  28. ^ "Filming Locations for Backbeat (1993), in London, Hamburg and Liverpool". The Worldwide Guide to Movie Locations. Retrieved 2020-05-18.

Bibliography

External links

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