John Lennon

Biography

John Winston Ono Lennon was born on October 9, 1940, at Liverpool Maternity Hospital during a German air raid on the city. After his parents separated, he was mainly raised by his aunt, Mimi Smith. Lennon went to Dovedale Primary School and later attended Calderstones School before enrolling at Liverpool College of Art. As a teenager, he became interested in skiffle music and rock and roll, leading him to form the Quarrymen in 1956, a group that eventually turned into the Beatles by 1960. His songwriting partnership with Paul McCartney is the most famous and successful collaboration in popular music history, producing numerous hit singles and albums that changed the global music scene throughout the 1960s.

As a member of the Beatles, Lennon was a founding member and rhythm guitarist, sharing lead vocals with McCartney. The band's influence reached far beyond record sales, changing youth culture, fashion, and attitudes worldwide. Lennon also made a name for himself as a writer, publishing two collections of humorous prose and drawings: In His Own Write in 1964 and A Spaniard in the Works in 1965, both of which were well-received by critics. The Beatles received Member of the Order of the British Empire honors in 1965, though Lennon later returned his medal to protest British foreign policy. By the late 1960s, his songs were closely linked with the counterculture and anti-war movements.

In 1969, Lennon married multimedia artist Yoko Ono, with whom he collaborated extensively for the rest of his life. That same year, he started the Plastic Ono Band and held the famous bed-in for peace protests in Amsterdam and Montreal, where he recorded Give Peace a Chance. After officially leaving the Beatles in 1969, he embarked on a solo career that included some of his most famous work. His 1971 album Imagine and its title track became international anthems for peace and humanist ideals. Moving to New York City in 1971, Lennon faced a long fight against the Nixon administration's attempt to deport him due to his outspoken criticism of the Vietnam War, a legal battle he eventually won when he got his permanent residency in 1976.

In the mid-1970s, Lennon and Ono briefly separated, a time he later called his lost weekend, lasting about eighteen months. During this period, he produced Harry Nilsson's album Pussy Cats and recorded successful collaborations with Elton John and David Bowie. After his son Sean was born in 1975, Lennon mostly stepped away from public life, becoming a house husband in their Dakota apartment in New York City. He returned to music in 1980, completing Double Fantasy with Ono, an album that explored themes of family life and new purpose. On December 8, 1980, three weeks after the album's release, Lennon was shot and killed by Mark David Chapman outside the Dakota. He was 40 years old. After his death, he received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1991 and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994.