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Celebrate the 50th anniversary of George Harrison’s “Living in the Material World” with special programming on The Beatles Channel (Ch. 18) and the SiriusXM app, including an exclusive roundtable discussion and special episodes of “Dark Horse Radio” and “Fab Fourum.”

See the full broadcast schedule below and stream anytime on the SiriusXM app.

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‘Living in the Material World’ 50th Anniversary About the Album

“Living in the Material World,” George Harrison’s highly praised second solo album of original music following The Beatles’ 1970 dissolution, recently marked its 50th anniversary.

With lyrics underscoring his enduring exploration of spiritual themes, the album resonated deeply with audiences. Just five weeks after its May 1973 release, both the LP and its single “Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)” held the top spots simultaneously on the U.S. albums and singles charts.

In her office at the Friar Park estate where she and George Harrison lived, Olivia Harrison grabs a piece of correspondence she only recently saw: a handwritten letter from her late husband to his mother when the Beatles were hanging with the Maharishi in India in 1968. “I became famous and made all this material wealth,” the letter reads in part. “That was only to enable me to see that there was more in life … I now know that I’m going to make it to the real top, which is...

Take a deep dive into John Lennon’s “Mind Games” album with “Lennon 360,” a four-part documentary on SiriusXM to commemorate the release of the new box set “Mind Games – The Ultimate Collection,” coming July 12.

This new, exclusive docuseries is available for a limited time on The Beatles Channel (Ch. 18) and the SiriusXM app beginning Friday. See the broadcast schedule below.

The Fab Four, 24/8Everything dedicated to The BeatlesListen on the App

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Mind Games – The Ultimate Collection

Fully authorized by Yoko Ono Lennon and produced by Sean Ono Lennon, “Mind Games – The Ultimate Collection” puts listeners in the center of the studio and explores the album’s 1973 recording sessions at the Record Plant in New York City, from inception to the final master, through scores of unreleased outtakes, unadulterated versions, instrumentals, stripped down mixes, studio chatter, and more, revealing how these fan-favorite songs evolved and came to life.

When it comes to iconic moments in rock history, one can include the Beatles’ rooftop concert, Jimi Hendrix’s literally incendiary set at the Monterey International Pop Festival, the 1973 Kool Herc party that helped launch hip-hop — and, of course, Alice Cooper and the chicken.

In September 1969, Cooper, not yet a household rock-weirdo name, was on the lineup of the Toronto Rock N Roll Revival, a festival that brought together two generations of rock stars. Pioneers like Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Bo Diddley were on the bill, sharing the day-long...

Before The Beatles were household names, they had several band members who would not stay with the group through their fame. The band fired drummer Pete Best, but they had bigger problems with the skill level of one-time bassist Stuart Sutcliffe. While they didn’t fire him — he was too good of friends with John Lennon — they didn’t want his subpar playing to affect their music. Their solution was rather mean-spirited.

The Beatles didn’t want the audience to hear one band member playing

Sutcliffe was a close friend of Lennon’s who used money he made selling paintings to purchase a bass guitar and new amps. He helped name the band and was one of Lennon’s closest friends. Despite this, he wasn’t much of a musician.

“Stuart was in the band now,” George Harrison said, per The Beatles Anthology. “He wasn’t really a very good musician.

Gary Wright, singer of mid-70s hits “Dream Weaver” and “Love Is Alive” as well as a close collaborator of George Harrison, has died at the age of 80.

Wright passed away Monday, September 4th, due to complications from Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementia.

Wright spent the early part of his musical career in Europe, where he fronted the blues rock outfit Spooky Tooth. While working on his debut solo album in the early 1970s, his bassist Klaus Voormann introduced him George Harrison, The two ended up becoming close friends and collaborators, with Wright playing keyboard on Harrison’s solo album All Things Must Pass and all subsequent releases during the 1970s. In turn, Harrison contributed to Wright’s 1971 solo album, Footprint.

Wright’s most successful solo release came in 1975 with The Dream Weaver. Both the title track and the song “Love Is Alive” hit No. 2 in the US,...

Singer-songwriter and synth pioneer Gary Wright, who penned the massive hits “Dream Weaver” and “Love Is Alive” and became George Harrison’s longtime friend and collaborator, died Monday morning. He was 80.

Wright’s son, Justin, confirmed the musician’s death to Rolling Stone, adding that the cause was Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementia. According to Justin, Wright was diagnosed with Parkinson’s “around six or seven years ago” before a subsequent dementia diagnosis. “He managed it fairly well for a while,” Justin tells Rolling Stone. “But a few years ago,...

While Ringo Starr let his bandmates control much of The Beatles’ creative direction, he was a force to be reckoned with on the drums. He was an excellent timekeeper and was a grounding force in the band. He was also a powerful drummer. According to audio engineer Geoff Emerick, Starr was a small man. Still, he hit the drums with such force that he left debris in the studio.

Ringo Starr hit the drums with great force

Starr has never been a flashy drummer, but he has a unique style. Emerick credits this to his stature.

“[His fills aren’t] fast — in fact, he himself has likened them to the sound of someone falling down the stairs — and they’re often a little laid back, a little behind the beat,” Emerick wrote in his book Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles. That’s not because he wasn’t...

Ringo Starr had a solid relationship with all of his Beatles bandmates, but he was incredibly close to John Lennon. Even after Lennon’s murder, the drummer showed respect by refusing to record a song of his that became a hit. The song we really want to hear, though, is the extended jam Ringo and John played on that Yoko Ono interrupted.

An impatient Yoko Ono broke up a lively jam with Ringo Starr, John Lennon, and Eric Clapton

Members of the Fab Four didn’t stop working together even though the band broke up. Ringo drummed on albums by each of his former bandmates. That included the simultaneous John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Yoko Ono/Plastic Ono Band projects in 1970.

The drummer was an early member of the rotating supergroup that orbited around John and Yoko.

Ringo, Eric Clapton, and longtime Beatles friend Klaus Voormann joined Lennon and...

It’s not a secret that drugs profoundly impacted The Beatles’ music. They completely changed their sound when they started using illegal substances and made some of the most enduring music of all time. But there were downsides, such as when George Harrison and his wife, Pattie Boyd, suspected his dentist of trying to start a drug-fueled orgy with them.

George Harrison and Pattie Boyd thought his dentist tried to start an orgy with them and John and Cynthia Lennon

The Beatles’ music wasn’t the only thing that changed in the 1960s. Harrison’s smile did, too. Dentist John Riley, something of a celebrity doctor in swinging London, helped straighten the guitarist’s teeth. Harrison and his first wife, Boyd, believed Riley wanted to have an orgy with them, John Lennon, and his first wife, Cynthia.

The two Beatles and their wives attended a dinner hosted by Riley one night in April 1965. Harrison,...

John Lennon might have been the first Beatle to mentally check out of the band. As he fell into a deep depression in the mid-1960s that he compared to going through murder, Paul McCartney became the de facto leader of the band. By then, the whole group had committed to not playing live, though John performed one more concert without his bandmates before leaving the group. Still, John lost a bet to Elton John and made one more proper, final concert appearance in the mid-1970s.

(l-r) Elton John and John Lennon | Steve Morley/Redferns John Lennon lost a bet with Elton John that led to his final major concert appearance

John all but stopped playing live when The Beatles stopped touring. Elton John single-handedly got the ex-Beatle back on stage in 1974, and it was the final time John Lennon played original songs in front of a massive concert crowd.

It took four of them to make the magic, but The Beatles were John Lennon’s band. He formed The Quarrymen and invited Paul McCartney and George Harrison to the group before they morphed into the Fab Four. John had a way with a song, but he didn’t have the best people skills. After he left a guitar god in the lurch, John complained about playing his first non-Beatles concert to a close friend and band insider.

(l-r) Yoko Ono and John Lennon | Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images John Lennon formed a supergroup to play a 1969 concert

The gears were churning, but The Beatles hadn’t officially broken up when John played the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival. The one-off festival took place on Sept. 13, 1969. It included a murderer’s row of superstar musicians, such as Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee Lewis, who were instrumental in John’s rock ‘n’ roll education.

Choosing George Harrison‘s best collaborations isn’t easy because there are so many. However, for this list, we kept it to the collaborations that happened in the recording studio only, whether they were on one of George’s tracks or another artist’s. Here are 10 of George’s best collaborations.

George Harrison and Eric Clapton | Dave Hogan/Getty Images 10. ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’

George used Chinese philosophy to write The Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” In his 1980 memoir, I Me Mine, he explained that he read that everything is relative to everything else in I Ching, the Chinese classic Book of Changes. So, he used it to write a song. He randomly opened a book and saw the words “gently weeps,” and the tune was born. It’s one of George’s best collaborations because he asked Eric Clapton to perform on it. The guitarist was hesitant...

The Beatles‘ friend Astrid Kirchherr was one of the few people who got to see them in their early days. She had a front-row seat throughout their residency in Hamburg, Germany, and witnessed their raw talent many times. The German photographer helped the band too. Without her, The Beatles would’ve had a terrible time abroad. Here’s what happened to Kirchherr, one of the most important people in The Beatles’ early years.

The Beatles and their friend Astrid Kirchherr | Max Scheler – K & K/Getty Images The Beatles’ friend Astrid Kirchherr helped them during their residency in Hamburg

In 1960, The Beatles left for one of the naughtiest cities in the world, Hamburg, Germany. Their first manager, Allan Williams, set up their residency at Bruno Koschmider’s Indra Club and the Kaiserkeller, where German artist Klaus Voormann first saw them perform.

He’d argued with his girlfriend, Astrid Kirchherr, and “wanted to let steam off.

There were many important people to The Beatles. Their friends and families go without being said. However, other essential people ensured the Fab Four were safe and cared for in their day-to-day lives. Here are the top 10 people crucial to The Beatles’ success and well-being.

Derek Taylor and The Beatles | Mirrorpix/Getty Images 10. Brian Epstein

Brian Epstein was The Beatles’ manager. He heard about them after a customer asked if he had a copy of The Beatles’ German single at his family’s record store. He learned they were from Liverpool and saw them play at The Cavern Club. Epstein didn’t always make the best financial decisions for the band, but he was like their father figure. He helped them the most, and when he unexpectedly died in 1967, they were left struggling to keep themselves afloat. John Lennon once said going somewhere without Epstein was like going somewhere without your pants on.

George Harrison would have turned 80 years old today. Though he died over two decades ago, his work continues to inspire people all across the globe.

Just this week, Yusuf, a.k.a. Cat Stevens, covered “Here Comes the Sun” and signed with Harrison’s label, Dark Horse Records. “While most of my generation were just into the music, I was a bit like George, where music became the key to something much higher,” he said. “I’m happy to sing one of his songs, especially as it represents the returning...

After The Monkees ended as both a band and a television series, Micky Dolenz spent several years exploring other aspects of the entertainment business. However, he remained a staple of the Hollywood nighttime scene due to a longtime friendship with Alice Cooper. Their recreational softball team turned drinking club became the legendary Hollywood Vampires. This eclectic band of musicians held court at Hollywood Rainbow Bar and Grill, raising what Dolenz called “holy hell” with a group that included John Lennon and Keith Moon.

John Lennon, Anne Murray, Harry Nilsson, Alice Cooper, and Micky Dolenz in 1973 | Richard Creamer/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images Related

‘The Monkees’: Peter Tork Opens Up About His Fight with Davy Jones: ‘The Little Sucker Hit Me First’

Who were The Hollywood Vampires?

The Hollywood Vampires members included some of the greatest musicians of the 1960s and 70s. These musicians included Alice Cooper, Harry Nilsson,...

7 December 2022 – Watch the new official video for The Beatles’ “Here, There & Everywhere” by Trunk Animation.

“Follow the band on tour, as they face an ever-changing backdrop of cities, hotels, roads, and gigs, with only each other to rely on. A magical dancer appears to each of them, representing inspiration and creative freedom.” – Richard Barnett, Trunk Animation.

The Special Edition releases of Revolver are out now.

Get The Beatles’ Revolver into your life with the new mixes and expanded Special Editions. Available everywhere October 28, 2022 across 5Cd/4Lp Super Deluxe, 2Cd Deluxe, Picture Disk, 1Lp, 1Cd, Download and Streaming. Dolby Atmos Mixes + original mono mix accompany never-before-released session recordings and demos, plus the “Paperback Writer” and “Rain” EP.

The Beatles’ 1966 album Revolver changed everything. Spinning popular music off its axis and ushering in a vibrant new era of experimental, avant-garde sonic psychedelia, Revolver brought about a cultural sea change and marked an...

An upcoming never-before documented story will recount “the second most important event in rock & roll history.”

“Revival69: The Concert That Rocked the World” will tell the “remarkable, behind-the-scenes story of how a little known, but life-altering music festival came together — against all odds.”

Check out our exclusive first look at the trailer above.

In 1969, a “young, scrappy concert promoter,” John Brower, put his life on the line “to turn his failing Toronto Rock n Roll Revival into a one-day event,” reads a description of the doc. With dismal ticket sales, the concert was nearly cancelled but Brower “took a one-in-a-million chance and invited John Lennon, who said yes, propelling the concert into a massively successful event” — one of three music festivals that changed the world that year.

Read More: John Lennon’s Scathing Letter To Paul McCartney After Beatles Split Expected To Sell For 30K At Auction

“REVIVAL69:...

In the summer of 1966, the Beatles dropped Revolver — an album so far ahead of its time that the world is still catching up with it. It’s the moptops mutating at warp speed, outgrowing all their former incarnations. Paul McCartney is exploring avant-garde art and music. John Lennon is reading The Tibetan Book of the Dead. George Harrison is studying sitar and Indian mysticism. Ringo Starr has installed a pub in his basement. They’re ready to shock the world — and themselves — with their masterpiece. The result: Revolver, routinely acclaimed...

Yes drummer Alan White, who joined the progressive rock band in 1972 and stayed with them for the next 50 years, has died at 72 after a brief illness.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee is most famous for his work in Yes, but also performed with John Lennon in the Plastic Ono Band — He’s featured on both “Instant Karma” and “Imagine” — and with George Harrison on All Things Must Pass.

“Throughout his life and six-decade career, Alan was many things to many people,” his family wrote in a statement confirming his death.

George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord” was released on Nov. 23, 1970, as the first single to his groundbreaking and historic solo album. The Beatles were the first band to play stadium concerts, put backwards instrumentation into songs, and the first rock band to put sitar and tamboura drones in pop rock. But Harrison’s first solo release after the band’s break up, All Things Must Pass, was the first triple album coming from a single act in rock. “My Sweet Lord,” was the first number one hit by a solo Beatle and the biggest selling single of 1971. It is most renowned because of the trendsetting plagiarism suit around it, but the song transcends easy labels.

Which is why the new music video, directed by Lance Bangs, deserves a little more than an all-star cast and a de-Phil Spector’d remix. The 51st anniversary video stars Fred Armisen, Vanessa Bayer,...

Previous | Image 1 of 6 | NextJohn Lennon, Yoko Ono and Johnny Brower (right of Yoko) meet the press.

Chicago – During the year 1969, in the midst of Woodstock and Summer of Soul, was the Rock ’n Roll Revival, taking place in Toronto, Canada. What makes this concert as significant as the other two – astoundingly, all three shows took place within three months of each other – is that a Canadian rock promoter named Johnny Brower snagged the biggest act of all for the show… John Lennon. The story of this amazing coup would make a great film, and that is what Brower is angling to create, along with Executive Producer Kristi Dunn Kucera.

The origin of the “Rock ’n Roll Revival’ lies with Johnny Brower, a young adult in the 1960s looking to participate in his passion … rock music. He began in a band, as most do, but his ability to book gigs expanded with other groups,...

George Harrison was all of 27 years old when he started making what became All Things Must Pass, in May 1970. The Beatles, the band to which he had dedicated his musical life since he was 15, were over, and Harrison spent the summer and fall in the studio, hammering out songs he had been sitting on and building new ones. He assembled an all-star cast of peers, from pal Eric Clapton and future Domino Bobby Whitlock to semi-Beatles Klaus Voormann and Billy Preston to actual Beatles Ringo Starr and John Lennon and a dozen more.

As Klaus Voormann recalls, the bass player, artist, and friend of the Beatles had no idea what was about to hit him when he arrived at Emi Studios (later known as Abbey Road) one day in late May of 1970. All he knew was that George Harrison was about to start a new project and that Ringo Starr would be drumming. Before he realized it, Voormann was rehearsing a bunch of unheard Harrison songs — one after another, 15 in all, including “What Is Life,” “Awaiting on You All,” and “My Sweet Lord.

The John Lennon estate has released a video for the new ‘Raw Studio Mix’ of John Lennon’s classic song “Isolation.” The song appears on John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band – the Ultimate Collection box set, which arrives on Friday via Capitol/UMe and is available for preorder.

Filmed at the couple’s Tittenhurst Park home in Berkshire, England, on July 16th, 1971 by Nic Knowland and directed by Lennon and Ono, the video gives an intimate glimpse of the upstairs area of the house, with shots from their master bedroom, dressing rooms,...

The John Lennon Estate has released a never-before-seen video of John Lennon and Yoko Ono rehearsing “Give Peace a Chance,” just days before they premiered the song in May of 1969.

The video was recorded by cameraman Nic Knowland and sound recordist Mike Lax and shows Lennon and Ono running through an ad-libbed demo version of the song in their room at the Sheraton Oceanus Hotel in the Bahamas. Dated May 25th, 1969, the video is the earliest known recording of “Give Peace a Chance,” and was filmed just days before Lennon...

The 1970 Bob Dylan/George Harrison sessions have circulated in bootleg form for decades, but they were finally released on Sunday as an extremely limited-edition package created solely to preserve the music’s copyright in Europe. The set was available for about four seconds via the website of the U.K. retailer Badlands. For the 99.999 percent of Dylan fans who didn’t manage to snag one, prepare to either shell out about $1,000 on the resale market or dive into the legal grey area of file sharing.

The recording sessions took place May 1st,...

Of all his post-Beatles undertakings, George Harrison was especially fond of All Things Must Pass, the 1970 triple-lp set he released months after the group had officially imploded.

“It was a really nice experience making that album — because I was really a bit paranoid, musically,” Harrison said a few years later. “I remember having those people in the studio and thinking, ‘God, these songs are so fruity!’ I’d play it to them and they’d say, ‘Wow, yeah! Great song!’ And I’d say, ‘Really? Do you really like it?...

Since its inception in 2008, Record Store Day has occurred annually on a single Saturday in April. But due to the ongoing pandemic, things are going to look a little different this year. The event that celebrates independent record shops around the world will be spread out in “drops” over the next few months. The three separate release dates — August 29th, September 26th, and October 24th — are intended to provide revenues to stores that have struggled during the pandemic while allowing the largest number of them to partake. Ahead of the first drop on Saturday,...

Updated with Ringo Starr reaction: Astrid Kirchherr, photographer and early friend of the Beatles whose avant-garde style helped transform the young band from ’50s-era greasers to moptop trend-setters, died Wednesday in her native Hamburg, Germany. She was 81.

The German newspaper Die Zeit reports that Kirchher died following a “short, serious illness,” with no additional details provided.

Beatles drummer Ringo Starr tweeted a tribute today, saying: “God bless Astrid a beautiful human being And she took great photos peace and love.”

Kirchherr, along with her friend Klaus Voormann, befriended the Beatles during the group’s early, pre-Beatlemania Hamburg club residencies, and the pair’s fashion sense — they were part of the city’s “Exi” (short for “existentialist”) youth subculture — quickly entranced original bassist Stuart Sutcliffe. Soon, the biker jackets and greased, Elvis-inspired pompadours so beloved by the teenage John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison were history, replaced with the style...

Astrid Kirchherr, the German-born photographer who first captured the Beatles, has died at the age of 81.

German newspaper Die Zeit confirmed Kirchherr’s death, noting the photographer died of a “short, serious illness.”

“Intelligent, inspirational, innovative, daring, artistic, awake, aware, beautiful, smart, loving and uplifting friend to many,” Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn tweeted (via NME). “Her gift to the Beatles was immeasurable. She died in Hamburg on Wednesday, a few days before turning 82.”

After attending performances by the Beatles — then John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, drummer Pete Best, and...

Now that Fleetwood Mac have wound up their world tour, guitarist Mike Campbell is turning his attention to his band the Dirty Knobs. The group of Los Angeles-based musicians, led by the Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers guitarist, is releasing their debut album Wreckless Abandon on March 20th. You can check out the video for the title track right here.

Mike Campbell formed the Dirty Knobs 15 years ago, but they have never gigged outside of Los Angeles or released an album. In addition to Campbell, the group features singer-guitarist Jason Sinay,...

If Alan White’s résumé was limited to playing drums on John Lennon’s Imagine and George Harrison’s All Things Must Pass, it would be pretty impressive. But about two years after appearing on those pivotal Beatles solo records, he was recruited by Yes — then at the peak of their creative powers — to replace the outgoing Bill Bruford. The band has seen a ludicrous amount of lineup changes since that time, but the one constant has been White’s presence behind the drum kit. These days, back issues limit...

On the morning of January 27th, 1970, John Lennon glimpsed his future. He and Yoko Ono had just returned from a nearly month-long trip to Denmark, where Ono was visiting her daughter with her second husband, Tony Cox, and his new wife, Melinda Kendall. During one of many conversations there, the idea of “karma” was brought up and dissected, and Lennon still had those thoughts in his head when he awoke that January day in his Tittenhurst Park home.

Not long after waking up, he sat down at a piano and,...

Tony Sokol Sep 23, 2018

John Lennon's Imagine album wasn't all peace and love. "How Do You Sleep?" woke up a tug of war.

Imagine all the Beatles living life in peace. Except Paul McCartney, of course, who spent quite a few restless nights after using his McCartney album to announce the breakup of the band before its leader and founder John Lennon got the chance to break the news. Oh boy. Universal Music is releasing the Imagine: The Ultimate Collection reissue on October 5. As a teaser, they dropped a never-before-seen footage from the Raw Studio Mixes disk Lennon and George Harrison recording "How Do You Sleep?"

"Imagine you are at the Lennon’s home, Tittenhurst Park in Ascot, England," reads the official description on YouTube. "It’s night. It’s the last week in May in 1971 and you are their special guest, sat in a chair in the very center of the their recording studio,...

The film Imagine, which John Lennon and Yoko Ono codirected and costarred in, will return to theaters this fall with extra footage. It also features restored footage and a newly remastered soundtrack mixed in Dolby Atmos by Paul Hicks, who has won Grammys for his work on the Beatles’ box set and Love soundtrack. The screenings will take place around the world on September 17th.

The couple made the film, not to be confused with the similarly titled 1988 film, in 1971 at their home in Ascot, England and released it the following year.

When Paul McCartney shocked the world in April 1970 with his announcement of the Beatles' break-up, drummer Ringo Starr added a surprise of his own by becoming (initially, at least) the most musically active member of the former Fab Four.

As he would later recount in the lyrics of "Early 1970," the deceptively jaunty b-side of his 1971 hit "It Don't Come Easy," Starr was the only Beatle who didn't have any serious beef with any other member of the band at the time. Feeling lost without the family dynamic of the musical...

I once wrote that Yoko Ono (born February 18, 1933) made more great albums than any solo Beatle, but also more bad albums. Of course, perspectives on Ono's music vary wildly, and the albums I think are great are the ones the mainstream rejected most vigorously. It's when she makes the most concessions to pop norms (whether rock or dance/electronic) and her lyrics get sappy that I don't like her work. But certainly anyone starting to explore her music could use some guidance.

There are plenty of places to read about her life, so I won't review that info, especially as I touched on some of it in my recent interview. But a few points are worth making, over and over, to counter clichés and misconceptions that have thrived for decades. Ms. Ono was a respected artist for years before she and John Lennon met near the end of 1966. And she didn't break up the Beatles,...

New York — An upcoming auction of over 300 historical documents includes rare letters written by Vincent van Gogh, George Washington, John Lennon and other iconic figures.

The property of an anonymous American collector is being offered by Profiles in History in an online and phone auction on Dec. 18.

Among the highlights is a two-page letter from Washington to an Anglican clergyman.

Another top item is a signed van Gogh letter, written in 1890, to Joseph and Marie Ginoux, who were proprietors of the Cafe de la Gare in Arles, France, where the Dutch post-impressionist artist lived for a time.

Each of those letters is estimated to bring $200,000 to $300,000.

A handwritten letter from John Lennon to Eric Clapton has a pre-sale estimate of $20,000 to $30,000.

The collection will be exhibited Dec. 3-9 at Douglas Elliman's Madison Avenue art gallery.

Washington's letter was written on Aug. 15, 1798, to the Rev. Jonathan Boucher, amid an undeclared naval war with France.

In our writers' favourite film series, Paul Owen explains why the Beatles bromance between John Lennon and Stuart Sutcliffe strikes a chord

• Not swayed by this perspective? Twist and shout in the comments below

Backbeat tells the story of the Beatles' pre-fame Hamburg days, focusing on Stuart Sutcliffe, the band's magnetically sexy original bassist, and his relationships with John Lennon and the beautiful and exotic German photographer Astrid Kirchherr. It's a great premise, and director and co-writer Iain Softley tells the tale with all the smart dramatic pacing, period detail and musical verve you might hope for. But, perhaps more surprisingly, he also creates a complex and emotionally sophisticated portrayal of love, friendship and attraction.

Softley hews to received wisdom in his presentation of the Beatles: John is talented, scabrous and aggressive, Paul weak and duplicitous, George third among equals (Ringo makes only a brief appearance). But his portrayal of...