BBC to air previously unheard Beatles outtakes

Here's a press release from the Beeb on a batch of upcoming Fab-related TV broadcasts:

Unheard outtakes from The Beatles' final recording sessions in Abbey Road will be broadcast for the first time as part of a BBC Fab Four season.

The programme, The Beatles On Record, will include studio chat from the band as they pieced together the album, which contained their final sessions as a band.

It also features what the BBC says is "rare footage", as well as excerpts from 60 songs.

It will be screened next month during a week-long season as the world prepares for the release of the band's remastered back catalogue and the much-anticipated Beatles Rock Band computer game.

The Beatles On Record has been directed by Bob Smeaton, who worked on the Beatles Anthology project which traced the story of the band and was screened on TV in 1995 to tie in with a series of albums of the same name.

The programmes will be screened across BBC Two and BBC Four and will include the TV premiere of the The Beatles: The First US Visit, in which cinematographers Albert and David Maysles charted the band's arrival in America in 1964.

An edition of Storyville will examine How The Beatles Rocked The Kremlin, revealing how the music of the band may have contributed to the collapse of the USSR, as a generation of Soviets were influenced by their music.

Other programmes in the short season will include a screening of the Help! movie.

George Entwistle, controller of BBC Knowledge commissioning, said: "This is a chance for viewers to enjoy some rare footage and fascinating insights into the career of the greatest pop group of all time."