Meet Lennon impersonator

MANILA, Philippines — It is quite a challenge to impersonate John Lennon, look as nearly as how he was, and sing almost exactly as he did. This, given his stature in music history and his life’s sensational nature up to the very bitter end. Yet, Michael Gagliano does it that good you would think he is employing some form of method acting into his sleeve to pull the trick. 

“You only need to love what you are doing to make it believable,” implied Michael after a quick chat with The STAR. 

Michael and other impersonators making up their own Beatles tribute ensemble find themselves currently in Manila to do an exclusive one-night Beatlemania performance for investors and buyers of The Estate Makati tonight at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in BGC, Taguig.  

The Beatles tribute band is associated with the Let It Be production which established itself as one of West End’s most popular show after it opened in 2012. It made its North American debut in the spring of 2015.

Michael and his mates met members of the press at the Penthouse of Grand Hyatt Hotel last Thursday afternoon. They sampled their act by singing snippets of the largely Lennon-written classic Nowhere Man and Twist and Shout, the famous cover track The Fab Four recorded one take with Lennon’s rocking lead vocals during a marathon recording for their debut album in 1963. 

“It’s my first time here and flying over I did think about that incident when The Beatles were here in Manila,” he mused, “Of course, it went alright for us.”

When asked to name a Beatles song they most liked, all four members picked Lennon-penned tracks: Across The Universe, Happiness Is A Warm Gun, I Want You (She’s So Heavy) and Strawberry Fields Forever, which Michael chose. 

He related, “Strawberry Fields Forever was unlike any other track that came out before it. It made us think that The Beatles were really good they must have come from another planet.”

Historically, it’s the first of several psychedelic compositions The Beatles worked on after abandoning touring in 1966. 

Michael’s deep fondness of Lennon is grounded on his outlook of the legend who was assassinated in December 1980 by a deranged fan who asked for his autograph same day he was fatally shot. He said of the singer-songwriter, “Everybody loves John because he was always real. The Beatles were somehow representation of us human beings. People are either John, Paul, George or Ringo.”

The Beatles once again made waves following the recent top-spot return to the UK charts of the album they last recorded, Abbey Road — 50 years after its release. 

The Estate is the luxury high-rise development on Ayala Avenue designed by award-winning British architectural firm Foster+Partners led by its founder Norman Foster. SMDC and Federal Land, Inc. are behind the hosting of the special treat described as “quintessentially British.”

In the music scene, who else is that but The Beatles.