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The Quarrymen (also written as "the Quarry Men") are a British skiffle/rock and roll group, formed by John Lennon in Liverpool in 1956,〔 which eventually evolved into the Beatles in 1960. Originally consisting of Lennon and several schoolfriends, the Quarrymen took their name from a line in the school song of Quarry Bank High School, which they attended. Lennon's mother, Julia Lennon, taught her son to play the banjo and then showed Lennon and Eric Griffiths how to tune their guitars in a similar way to the banjo, and taught them simple chords and songs. Lennon started a skiffle group that was very briefly called the Blackjacks, but changed the name before any public performances. Some accounts credit Lennon with choosing the new name; other accounts credit his close friend Pete Shotton with suggesting the name. The Quarrymen played at parties, school dances, cinemas and amateur skiffle contests before Paul McCartney joined the band in October 1957. George Harrison joined the band in early 1958 at McCartney's recommendation, though Lennon initially resisted because he felt Harrison (still 14 when he was first introduced to Lennon) to be too young. Both McCartney and Harrison attended the Liverpool Institute. The group made an amateur recording of themselves in 1958, performing Buddy Holly's "That'll Be the Day" and "In Spite of All the Danger", a song written by McCartney and Harrison. In early 1960, the group started exploring various alternative names. After Lennon recruited his art school pal Stuart Sutcliffe to the group, they tried the name the Silver Beetles and other variations, before finally settling on The Beatles in August 1960 when they first performed in Hamburg. In 1997 the four surviving original members of the Quarrymen reunited to perform at the 40th anniversary celebrations of the garden fete performance at which Lennon and McCartney met for the first time. The band decided to continue playing, and since 1998 have performed in many countries throughout the world. Griffiths died in 2005, and Shotton retired due to ill-health. As of 2015, three original members are still actively performing as the Quarrymen. == Early years == In the mid-1950s, there was a revival in the United Kingdom of the musical form "skiffle" that had originated in the United States and had been popular in the US in the 1920s, '30s and '40s. In addition to its popularity among British teenagers as music to listen to, it also spawned a craze of teenage boys starting their own groups to perform the music. One of the primary attractions was that it did not require great musical skills or expensive instruments to be played.〔 Early British skiffle was played by traditional jazz musicians, with the most successful British proponent of the genre in the 1950s being Lonnie Donegan. The Quarrymen's initial repertoire included several songs that Donegan had recorded. When Lennon wanted to try making music himself, he and fellow Quarry Bank school friend, Griffiths, took guitar lessons in Hunt's Cross, Liverpool, although Lennon gave up the lessons soon after, as they were based on theory and not actual playing. As Griffiths already knew how to play the banjo, Lennon's mother showed them how to tune the top four strings of their guitars to the same notes as a banjo, taught them the chords of D, C, and D7, and the Fats Domino song, "Ain't That a Shame".〔"The Beatles Anthology" DVD (2003) (Episode 1 – 0:14:29) Lennon talking about his mother teaching him "Ain't That a Shame".〕 They practised at Lennon's aunt's house (called Mendips) at 251 Menlove Avenue where Lennon lived, or at Griffiths' house in Halewood Drive. They learned how to play "Rock Island Line", "Jump Down Turn Around (Pick a Bale of Cotton)", "Alabamy Bound" and "Cumberland Gap", and later learned how to play "That's All Right" and "Mean Woman Blues".〔"The Beatles Anthology" DVD (2003) (Episode 1 – 0:12:39) Harrison talking about Lonnie Donegan and the influence of "Rock Island Line".〕 Lennon started his own skiffle band (very briefly called the Blackjacks) with Griffiths in the summer of 1956, and recruited his best friend, Shotton, even though he could not play an instrument.〔(AMG biography ) Retrieved 29 January 2007〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Pete Shotton – Washboard )〕 Shotton elected to play the washboard, as it simply required percussive strumming and no lessons, so his mother supplied a washboard she found in the shed, and two thimbles from her sewing box. A week later Shotton asked Bill Smith, another school friend, to play a home-made tea chest bass, and Griffiths invited another school friend, Rod Davis (who had just purchased a banjo), to join the group.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Rod Davis (Banjo – now Guitar) )〕〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Eric Griffiths — Guitar )〕 After a few days the Blackjacks name was abandoned. Both Lennon and Shotton have been credited with coining the name Quarrymen after a line in their school's song: ''"Quarrymen, old before our birth. Straining each muscle and sinew"''. The choice of name was tongue-in-cheek as Lennon regarded the reference in the school song to "straining each muscle and sinew" as risible.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Myth Busting )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Quarrymen」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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