Biography
Few individuals outside the Beatles themselves took the lead vocal on any commercially issued Beatles recording, aside from Yoko Ono’s short spoken fragment in “The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill.” Tony Sheridan is the best-known example. Far less familiar are the two brothers who fronted tracks taped in Germany and later included on Beatles albums: Horst Fascher and Fred Fascher, who respectively sang “Hallelujah, I Love Her So” and “Be-Bop-a-Lula” on Live! At the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany, a set recorded in the final days of December 1962. Among fans, Horst Fascher remains the more widely recognized of the pair.
He first crossed paths with the Beatles late in 1960 while working security at Hamburg’s Kaiserkeller Club during the group’s initial residency there. Like the Beatles, he soon moved his allegiance to the Top Ten Club. In early 1962 Fascher, accompanied by musician Roy Young, traveled to Liverpool to obtain Brian Epstein’s signature on a contract booking the band at the Star-Club, an establishment Fascher helped run. He remained on close terms with the group and has often been recalled as an unofficial bodyguard.
The precise date or dates in late December 1962 when the Beatles were recorded live at the Star-Club using basic equipment are still disputed. Dozens of those performances eventually appeared on various albums, beginning with the 1977 release Live! At the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany. Two songs on that album, “Hallelujah I Love Her So” and “Be-Bop-a-Lula,” clearly featured a vocalist other than any Beatle. The original sleeve notes by Chris White made no mention of the fact, leaving listeners baffled. Theories circulated that the singer might be Ringo Starr, Pete Best, or John Lennon affecting a different voice. Later editions credited the performances to “Horst Obber,” an error that only deepened the confusion; because “Ober” is German for waiter, someone had evidently referred to “Horst the waiter,” and the name was phonetically rendered in English.
In truth the voice on “Hallelujah I Love Her So” belongs to Horst Fascher, while his brother Fred Fascher, a waiter at the club, sang “Be-Bop-a-Lula.” Both performances sound stiff and hesitant, unsurprising given that the singers were performing in a second language. In the book Beatles Undercover, Fascher is quoted as saying: “When I had two or three beers, I was a little more confident and I would get up and sing sometimes! I would only sing the songs I knew the words to because my English was not so good at the time.” The account was written by Richie Unterberger.
He first crossed paths with the Beatles late in 1960 while working security at Hamburg’s Kaiserkeller Club during the group’s initial residency there. Like the Beatles, he soon moved his allegiance to the Top Ten Club. In early 1962 Fascher, accompanied by musician Roy Young, traveled to Liverpool to obtain Brian Epstein’s signature on a contract booking the band at the Star-Club, an establishment Fascher helped run. He remained on close terms with the group and has often been recalled as an unofficial bodyguard.
The precise date or dates in late December 1962 when the Beatles were recorded live at the Star-Club using basic equipment are still disputed. Dozens of those performances eventually appeared on various albums, beginning with the 1977 release Live! At the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany. Two songs on that album, “Hallelujah I Love Her So” and “Be-Bop-a-Lula,” clearly featured a vocalist other than any Beatle. The original sleeve notes by Chris White made no mention of the fact, leaving listeners baffled. Theories circulated that the singer might be Ringo Starr, Pete Best, or John Lennon affecting a different voice. Later editions credited the performances to “Horst Obber,” an error that only deepened the confusion; because “Ober” is German for waiter, someone had evidently referred to “Horst the waiter,” and the name was phonetically rendered in English.
In truth the voice on “Hallelujah I Love Her So” belongs to Horst Fascher, while his brother Fred Fascher, a waiter at the club, sang “Be-Bop-a-Lula.” Both performances sound stiff and hesitant, unsurprising given that the singers were performing in a second language. In the book Beatles Undercover, Fascher is quoted as saying: “When I had two or three beers, I was a little more confident and I would get up and sing sometimes! I would only sing the songs I knew the words to because my English was not so good at the time.” The account was written by Richie Unterberger.
Albums