SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND, AND ME

Paul Saltzman was 23 when he met John, George, Paul and Ringo in India and photographed them as they wrote, among others, “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da.” “Their creativity just emerged as this joyful brilliance,” he says. “I was in a state of bliss.”

BY BEN KAPLAN | PHOTOGRAPHS BY PAUL SALTZMAN

Paul Saltzman has won two Emmys and been involved in more than 300 films, but the producer, director and writer says it was meeting John Lennon, as much as anything, that taught him about love. “I was in a place of almost unfathomable heartbreak when I arrived in India,” he says. “After meeting the band and learning meditation, I knew I’d never be the same again, for which I hugely felt thankful.”

KIND: This was God?

PS: I’d been brought up to be an atheist. There was no God, no soul, no spirit. There were parts of myself back then that I didn’t like, but in this one moment, I hear this calm, all-loving voice of kindness actually speak to me. And so I responded: “Where do I go?” To which my soul said, “India,” and that was the end of that first conversation.

KIND: You say discovering things in yourself you didn’t like was “a gift.” How so?

PS: Being conscious is the road less travelled. Being unconscious is easy. But it’s a thousand times more fulfilling—you feel more joy, love and wisdom—when you awaken. I’ve lived unconsciously at various points in my life, but then I wake myself up: this is not what I want. And that’s the mind I was in when I met the Beatles.

KIND: The Beatles today are hard to fathom as actual people. John Lennon seems to me more than a man, almost like a saint.

PS: When I met him I had been waiting outside the ashram for eight days. I didn’t go to the ashram to meet the Beatles, I didn’t even know that they were there. I was devastated from a deep heartbreak so when I made it inside, and experienced my first meditation, I was transcending normal consciousness and the agony just disappeared.

KIND: Experiencing bliss?

PS: Yes, and it was my first time ever attempting meditation. And it was like I had gone out of my body and let my consciousness go, and connected to the presence of universal love—what people call “God” or “goddess”—and it was like I was stoned. I felt no stress, no heartbreak, just a state of bliss. And because of that altered state, when I saw the Beatles sitting by a cliff, I found myself curving towards them, walking in bliss.

KIND: For a minute, you almost choked.

PS: My heart was beating a bit faster, but I didn’t want anything from them and then again I heard my soul speaking. It said, “They’re just human beings. Everyone farts, and is afraid in the night.”

KIND: That’s right.

PS: John looks up at me. I asked, “May I join you?” And he says, “Sure, mate,” and that was it. For the next week I was accepted into their little family. Magic, which has a very specific meaning, “That which is real, but as yet we don’t understand.”

KIND: What were they like?

PS: Lovely. They were in a great, free, creative moment. They were writing and snapping photographs of each other. Very in tune. Joyful brilliance. And very wise.

KIND: You talked to John about your broken heart.

PS: Yes. He said, “Love can be very tough on us. But the really great thing is it always happens again.”

KIND: My God. And then at some point it must have dawned on you to take out your camera.

PS: The whole week I spent with them I was in the flow. I’d been suffering and now I’m in joy, and in this state of bliss. I only took out my camera twice.

KIND: I could see that breaking the spell.

PS: Two or three days after hanging out with them I’d become part of the group, and they all had Nikons and were taking snapshots of each other, and I wanted to be respectful. So I asked each of them individually if they minded me shooting and they all said, “Go right ahead.”

KIND: And you not only got John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo, but also Mia Farrow, Donovan and the Beach Boys’ Mike Love. Like a music lover’s heaven.

PS: Yes. Ringo showed me how to use his 16mm camera so he would be in the footage.

KIND: Talk about the role Beatles music now plays in your life.

PS: Joy.

KIND: Can you explain?

PS: Their creativity is joyfully brilliant, so what it does for me is lift my soul. When I was sitting with them, Paul and John were working on “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” and they were singing bits and pieces of it. Fooling around. Playing! Singing it over and over again, ob-la-di, ob-la-da, and under Paul’s sandal was a little yellow piece of paper that had just those words written on it and they’d be increasing the tempo and bending the words. They were exploring the words and melody.

KIND: One of the greatest songs ever written in the history of music and you were there with your camera, in a state of bliss, firing away.

PS: The joy that their music has provided me has been a key part of the evolution of my life.

KIND: It’s interesting how so much of their music is about love.

PS: If we had more love for ourselves and others, there’s be no war. All you need is love and it has the potential to be infinite.

KIND: What remains of your memories from your time in India with the band?

PS: Explore! Find yourself in delight! Take care of your body and soul and listen to your soul because in that part, the part that is sometimes easier to ignore, you find yourself. And you find love.

The Beatles in India, photographs and text by Paul Saltzman, with a forward by Pattie Boyd and an afterword by Donovan, is available at thebeatlesinindia.com.