Get ready to twist and shout like it’s 1965.
The 60th anniversary of the Beatles’ iconic concert at Shea Stadium will be celebrated by the New York Mets when they host the Seattle Mariners at Citi Field on Aug. 15.
It was on that day six decades ago that John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr took the stage set up at second base of the Mets’ former ballpark for what became one of the most memorable performances in music history.
And now Beatlemania is returning to Queens.
The Beatles Night celebration at Citi Field, which is adjacent to where Shea Stadium once stood, will open with a pregame performance in front of the Shea Bridge by 1964 The Tribute. The longtime Beatles cover band is known for recreating the look, feel and sound of the Fab Four’s early performances of the 1960s.
The first 15,000 fans in attendance will receive a mini replica of Shea Stadium, which was torn down after hosting its final game in 2008.
Game-day staff members who worked the famous concert will throw out the ceremonial first pitch.
The festivities conclude with a postgame fireworks show featuring the Beatles’ music.
Some of those very songs were played live by the Beatles at Shea Stadium when they became the first rock band to perform a major stadium concert. They sang a 12-song set — beginning with their hit “Twist and Shout” — in front of 55,000-plus screaming fans who drowned out nearly all of the Fab Four’s vocals.
“Now it’s quite commonplace for people to play Shea Stadium or Giants Stadium and all those big places, but this was the first time,” Paul McCartney said in “The Beatles Anthology.” “It seemed like millions of people, but we were ready for it. They obviously felt we were popular enough to fill it. Once you go onstage and you know you’ve filled a place that size, it’s magic, just walls of people.”
McCartney also performed at the venue’s final concert in June 2008 when he made a surprise appearance at Billy Joel’s “The Last Play at Shea.”
