THE GIFT: 40 YEARS AGO, I RECORDED WITH JOHN AND YOKO ON DOUBLE FANTASY

Randy Stein - English Concertina

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Feb 20, 2021

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This is the 40th Anniversary of the release of John Lennon’s last LP, Double Fantasy. I played on this album. In the past many people would ask me about my experience and expect some profound detailed explanation. I even heard a story that John saw me street performing and asked me into the studio. But the truth is, as a member of the local 802 Musicians Union, I was often contacted for shows and studio recordings and this situation was really not that different. Except that it was. I was a professional musician who played the English Concertina and was hired to play and record the music of the former Beatle, John Lennon. It was, as a close friend called it, a gift.

It was a mid-September evening when I received a call from Stan Vincent, a music contractor, asking if I was available for an overdub (the process of laying new audio material in, over, or with existing material. Generally, this applies to adding parts to a multitrack recording) at the recording studio, Fantasy Factory. He then filled me in on who and what the gig involved. Needless to say, I was a bit skeptic and inwardly exploding at the same time. Stan requested that I keep this very quiet and not tell a lot of people. The next morning, I was met at the studio by Jack Douglas and John Lennon. This could not have come at a better time in my life.

A year prior, having saved some money, I left NYC and went to LA to try my hand at the opportunities I expected to be there. They weren’t. In fact, many of the recording and performance opportunities offered to me were for little or no pay because, I was told, it was “a great opportunity”. When it did pay, because I didn’t own a car (a serious disability in LA), a cab ride to any performance was expensive and ate into what little I received. Eventually I had to move out of the place I was renting in North Hollywood and stay with some relatives for a while hoping to regroup. After 10 months on the west coast I eventually made my way back to NYC. Broke and somewhat homeless, I crashed with various friends on their living rooms sofas and in one case a cot in a room used for storage. I immediately jumped back into playing. During the day I performed in Battery Park and the new South Sea Seaport and at night I would perform in various restaurants. Having been gone from the city for the year I began reestablish my network of previous and new contacts in the music business. This was not like now. No internet. It was phone calls, drop ins, mailing postcards, etc. It was laborious and costly. Then the call from Stan came.

In the studio I was seated in a folding chair across from Jack Douglas and next to John Lennon. We all were in very close proximity to each other. Through the large window in front of us were framed two sound engineers seated before the vast sound board with Yoko in the background. There was no printed music. No music stands. It was just three musicians, two guitars, and an English Concertina. We worked slowly and methodically, sometimes playing through just one or two measures at a time to get the exact feeling and sound accompaniment they were looking for. We spent close to 2 hours of focused playing and recording until John, Jack, and Yoko felt they had exactly what they wanted. The song was called Beautiful Boy, Darling Boy.

When we were done John asked me about my instrument. “What do you call it?’ he asked.

‘An English Concertina’ I told him.

He smiled and said ‘English Concertina. I rather like that. Nice job chap.’

And that was it. I spoke to Jack Douglas about some paperwork and left. Not until I got outside to the street did the import of what just happened hit me. I grabbed a cab downtown to meet and tell my friends about it. They listened but somehow nothing translated the way I wanted. A couple months later the album was released and hit the stores. And there was my name in the credits for musician attributions. I bought the LP and walked around the streets of Greenwich Village most of the afternoon. Just being in the moment.

A lot changed after that. We sadly lost a brilliant musical genius and influence to an untimely tragic death. Something that still brings great sadness to me. I made my living full time as a musician, playing and performing exclusively on the English Concertina prolifically arranging tunes to play self accompanied in French and Italian establishments around NYC. Instead of performing with an open case for coins, I was hired by the South Street Seaport on the southside of Manhattan as the “house musician”. While the intervention of more and more sophisticated digital and electronic music diminished a lot of recording studio work, I still received calls to perform and record around the tristate area. Eventually I would meet a wonderful and brilliant woman, an actress, who I would marry and share my life with for 39 years and counting. It was when our son was born that we realized we needed to better our lives, plan for the future, and make a change outside of show business, travel, and our small expensive Brooklyn apartment.

The opportunity of recording on Double Fantasy was a momentous and changing experience for me both professionally and personally. My life was transformed from that moment on. I’ve profoundly grown since that time in ways that I cannot even begin understand or explain. 40 years later, with adult children and a grandchild, the pace of our lives has slowed down a bit. I am playing and teaching the English Concertina full time and enjoying new and challenging musical experiences. John Lennon and I are part of each other’s musical history. I am but an asterisk on the footnote of his. He is a great story for me. A gift to remember and cherish to my grave.

Randy Stein

Nov 15, 2020