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North Iowa Area Community College and the Globe Gazette are honored to present Rain: The Beatles Experience. Rain: The Beatles Experience will take the North Iowa Community Auditorium stage on Thursday, March 12, at 7:30 p.m. as a part of the 2008-2009 NIACC Performing Arts Series. Tickets are on sale now and cost $35 in advance and $40 at the door. 

The history of Rain: The Beatles Experience actually pre-dates the Broadway hit Beatlemania, from which Rain: The Beatles Experience 's all-star cast was recruited. When Dick Clark searched for the musicians to record the sound track for "Birth of The Beatles,” he didn't have to look much further than to this talented group. No other group can claim the level of talent and true musicianship contained within this band.

There are other acts who respectfully attempt to replicate a subset of The Beatles music, but only Rain: The Beatles Experience can perform the full range of The Beatles discography live onstage, including the most complex and challenging songs that The Beatles themselves recorded in the studios but never performed for an audience. No other rendition of the Fab Four's music comes close to this level of performance, which has taken years of mastery and attention to detail that is unmatched. From the early days of their appearance on the Ed Sullivan show in 1964, through the Sergeant Pepper era and on to the Abbey Road years, Rain: The Beatles Experience 's performance captures it all flawlessly.

In their production of Rain: The Beatles Experience, this show is a multi-media, multi-dimensional event which features five different scene and costume changes, three video screens and live camera projection, combining television commercials and historical video footage from the 1960s. As anyone who has witnessed Rain: The Beatles Experience in concert will attest, the music is first and foremost, and is recreated with the utmost care and integrity. Rain: The Beatles Experience distinguishes itself by focusing on details, and delivers a perfect note for note performance. All the music is performed live, with no pre-recorded tapes or sequences.

"They're the Mozarts of pop," Rain: The Beatles Experience keyboardist Mark Lewis says of The Beatles. Rain: The Beatles Experience 's energy and devotion to even the most minute details of the recordings of John, Paul, George and Ringo led a critic for the Portland Oregonian newspaper to write, "The band contains better musicians than The Beatles - but then, they'd almost have to be in order to recreate the sound so well."

The giddy excitement at every Rain: The Beatles Experience show can be attributed to three distinct factors working magically together. One is the universal appeal of The Beatles' music. Second is the power of that music when played to uncanny perfection. Third is the cohesive stagemanship of the members in Rain: The Beatles Experience, who have been playing together for more than twice as long as The Beatles did, and, indeed, are a band in the truest sense.

The five members of Rain: The Beatles Experience, each a huge Beatle fan himself, use The Beatles' albums like textbooks, constantly referring to them to ensure the songs performed live include every harmony, vocal tone, chord inversion, handclap, cowbell, string arrangement. That's why Rain: The Beatles Experience 's music meets the expectations of audiences "who know The Beatles' music subconsciously," as keyboardist Lewis explains.

To replicate The Beatles' studio sounds on stage (and with no pre-recorded tracks) would be impossible without prodigious musicianship. After all, The Beatles were in their early-to-mid 20s during their concert heyday. They'd typically play for 22 minutes, singing in high keys. A Rain: The Beatles Experience show typically runs two and a half hours, with the songs performed in their original keys. That takes stamina, topnotch singing ability and dazzling technical prowess on a variety of instruments. What's more, The Beatles themselves quit touring in 1966. The pioneering, intricate recordings from Sergeant Pepper through Abbey Road were never performed live by the group. That adds another dimension of difficulty for Rain: The Beatles Experience. But the band - supplemented by various sounds of the Beatles background instrumentation from offstage keyboardist Lewis' synthesizer and, when needed, Joe Bithorn's guitar synthesizer - carries through.

Finally, Rain: The Beatles Experience 's members are indefatigable perfectionists who, even after 4,000 shows together, rehearse exhaustively before every extended concert run. The four onstage members are veterans of the made-for-Broadway stage show Beatlemania and not only project the physical looks, speech and traits of the immortal lads from Liverpool, but the camaraderie and charisma The Beatles possessed to a degree even their nearest competitors, the Rolling Stones, never could match. Like The Beatles, the members of Rain: The Beatles Experience are not only supreme musicians - but electrifying performers.

For tickets to Rain: The Beatles Experience, call the NIACC Box Office at 1-888-466-4222, ext.4188.  Tickets may also be purchased online at www.niacc.edu.  Platinum sponsors for the 2008-2009 series include NIACC, Globe Gazette Elizabeth Muse Norris Charitable Fund; the Globe Gazette; Alliant Energy; Community National Bank; Henkel Construction; and Principal Financial Group.  Gold sponsors include Diamond Jo Casino; First Citizens National Bank; First State Bank of Belmond; Kraft; Mercy Medical Center – North Iowa; Martin, Cooney, MacNider & Cooney, Financial Consultants of Raymond James and Associates, Inc.; Dr. Gary W. Swenson and Dean A. Genth; and Sukup Manufacturing.  In kind sponsors include Country Inn and Suites; KIMT; and Pepsi.

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