The Beatles: Today and Yesterday (Part 1)

(AP Photo, File)

Fifty years ago, in February 1964, The Beatles invaded America, changing music and our culture forever. What made The Beatles and their music so different and so special?

FOX News Radio’s Sabrina Sabbagh explores that topic and more in part one of our special series: “The Beatles: Today and Yesterday.”

(“Revolution”)

The Beatles revolutionized music in a way that no other artist or band ever did before… Or since. But… How?

(“I Wanna Hold Your Hand”)

(Levinson) “They started out doing very simple love songs and within a few years their music was being praised by classical musicians like Leonard Bernstein as being just as good, if not better than classical music.”

Paul Levinson is a professor of media studies at Fordham University and credits the Beatles success with their progression in lyrics, going from “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”, to songs on Sgt. Pepper that were as advanced as Bob Dylan’s.

(“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”)

But there was something about the Beatles when they first came out that made them instantly popular and Levinson says it was more simple than you might think.

(Levinson) “They just had their guitars and Ringo playing the drums, and that’s all that it was.”

It was fresh, and it was raw… And so began Beatlemania.