Hamburg to become Beatlemania city with £2.15mn permanent exhibition

London: Hamburg is to finally exploit its claim to fame as the city that nurtured the world`s most famous pop group – The Beatles.A permanent ‘Beatlemania’ exhibition worth 2.15-million-pound has opened on the Reeperbahn, a street in Hamburg`s St Pauli district, one of the two centres of Hamburg`s nightlife and also the city`s red-light district.

In the early 1960s, the Fab Four – John, Paul, George and Ringo, who had not yet became world-famous, played in several clubs in the area, including the Star-Club, Kaiserkeller, Top Ten and Indra. However, until now the area has not exploited its ties to the group. Hamburg`s ‘Beatlemania’ exhibition, which aims to attract at least 250,000 visitors a year, recounts the Beatles time in Hamburg before they became global superstars. The project, which follows the construction of a special ‘Beatles Square’ on the Reeperbahn, has been privately funded by the German music industry but has the full backing of the city government. "The Reeperbahn is having to change the emphasis of what it offers to visitors," a news daily quoted Guido Neumann as saying. "The place no longer attracts sailors from the port because container shipping means that they spend hardly any time in harbour," he added. ANI