EXCERPT: Paul McCartney (now Sir Paul) performed at Boston's Fenway Park, playing music of the Beatles, Wings, and his own solo career -- at age 67!
By many conventional standards, he's an old man, past the usual retirement age, with grown children of his own, yet he is still devoted to performing a young man's music.
In McCartney's case, this is all the more striking because the Beatles themselves stopped performing live concerts half way through their brief career (in their mid-20s) and produced much of their most celebrated music (the albums Revolver, Sergeant Pepper, the "White Album," Let It Be, and Abbey Road) as studio recordings. So McCartney now, in his late 60s, offers stage performances of songs such as "Yesterday" or “Back in the USSR,” which the Beatles never played in concert in their 20s.
Moreover, McCartney ranks among the richest entertainers in the world -- perhaps the richest. He's still making money from songs he wrote nearly 50 years ago. A concert tour is real work: the travel, living out of suitcases, catering to media, rehearsing constantly changing venues. Yet McCartney has absolutely no need to earn the money that touring brings.
So we naturally wonder: why is Sir Paul still playing at his advanced age?
No comments:
Post a Comment