Sid Bernstein

Sid Bernstein  was an American music producer and promoter. Bernstein changed the American music scene in the 1960s by bringing The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Herman's Hermits, The Moody Blues, and The Kinks to America. He was the first impresario to organize rock concerts at sports stadiums.

Sid Bernstein was born in New York City in 1918. During World War II, he served in France with the 602nd Anti-Aircraft Artillery Gun Battalion of the United States Army.

Bernstein helped start the British Invasion by bringing The Beatles over to the United States from Britain.

In late December 1963, the unknown Beatles were introduced to the Tidewater area of Virginia. Almost every other song played by the area’s DJs were Beatle records, accompanied by giveaways of shirts, etc. The following month in very early January 1964, the same phenomenon occurred, as the Beatles were introduced to the New York City area complemented by all sorts of contests and gifts.

They played at Carnegie Hall after their appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Bernstein also booked them at Shea Stadium, a concert that Bernstein described as "inaudible." During the Beatles Shea concert, Bernstein had the phrase "The Rascals are coming!" displayed on the Shea Stadium scoreboard. "I had met the Rascals in the summer of '65; I put their name up on the scoreboard (at Shea) - 'The Rascals are coming! The Rascals are coming!' A lot of people who hadn't seen pictures of them thought they were a black group. I sensed something big about them."

He worked with the Rascals for five years, helping along their rise from obscurity, changing their name from "Young Rascals" to "the Rascals" in an attempt to avoid controversy.

Bernstein also organized concerts for Lenny Kravitz, Frank Sinatra, Jimi Hendrix, Laura Branigan, Melanie and Sly & the Family Stone. In 1964, he brought many Israeli singers to the United States for their first major concerts, among them Shoshana Damari, Shaike Ophir and Yaffa Yarkoni, who appeared at Carnegie Hall a year after the Beatles.

Bernstein was the first to stage a rock show at Madison Square Garden.

At age 93, Bernstein released his first album as a singer. Sid Bernstein Presents... is a collection of some of his favorite songs, and was released on February 14, 2012 as a digital download. The album is available at the iTunes Store, CD Baby, and other online outlets.

While Bernstein has helped so many in show business, he is perhaps best known for bringing the Beatles to Carnegie Hall and, later, Shea Stadium. "I'm a hunch player, you see," states Sid modestly. "I was just glad to get this group I had been reading about for months. It took eight months after I booked them for there to be any airplay of their records on the radio. I had to convince Carnegie Hall and my financial backers to take a chance on this then-unknown group. I had been reading about their progress in the European papers and was fascinated with the hysteria that surrounded them. I was the first to promote the Beatles in the States and Ed Sullivan called me first about them before he ever booked them on his television show." 

The books, Not Just the Beatles and It’s Sid Bernstein Calling…The Promoter Who Brought the Beatles to America  told by Bernstein and written by friend Arthur Aaron, are accounts of these and so many other stories presented by a most remarkable and masterful storyteller.    "My secret to success is that I've always loved good music and people," summarizes Sid. "The players in the promotion business today are, by and large, not in it for the art anymore. It's all about how many bucks can you make on a concert. That's permissible. I mean we are in a capitalistic society. But I feel a lot of the art thing is lost. It shouldn't just be about money. It should be about loving what you do."

www.bernstein.com