Louise Harrison is the oldest sibling and only sister of The Beatles' guitarist George Harrison. Shortly after George's death on Dec. 1, 2001, Louise discovered The Beatles tribute bands, one in particular, are a nice way of keeping her brother's memory alive.

Today Louise, now 73, manages The Beatles tribute band the Liverpool Legends. Louise and the Liverpool Legends will be at Nashville's Tennessee Performing Arts Center Thursday, July 7, as part of The Beatles festival "The Fab Four at TPAC: The Nashville Connection."

"About three months after my brother died, I got invited to a Beatles weekend in Chicago," recalls Louise in her still distinct English accent. "I met a guy there who played George and he reminded me of my brother so much, I thought maybe my brother was looking around the planet for someone to replace him for me. I kind of adopted him and I even call his parents Mum and Dad, even though they are about 10 years younger than I am."

The guy to whom Louise refers is Marty Scott who plays George in the Liverpool Legends. At the time Scott played in a different Beatles tribute band, but when Scott and Kevin Mantegna, the guy who plays John Lennon, decided to leave the group, Louise was the first person they approached for help.

"They were putting together another Beatles band and since I had always been very supportive of my earthly brother, I wanted to do the same for him," she explains. "Now I travel with them and I manage them. A lot of people say they are the best Beatles band out there."

However, before the Liverpool Legends could travel anywhere, Louise, Scott and Mantegna had to find suitable players to portray Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr. It was important to Louise that the new additions fit The Beatles persona as closely as the players already enlisted.

"We had a George and a John," recalls Louise. "We needed a Paul and a Ringo. The John and George are the best I've ever seen. (Kevin Mantegna) is so much like John, I often feel like I've been transported back 20 years. I would often be sitting in the room with John (Lennon) and he would be talking a lot of nonsense, but when he would finish, he actually said something profound. (Mantegna) is the same way."

The search for additional members ended with the acquisition of Davey Justice as Paul McCartney and Joe Bologna as Ringo Starr.

"The guy who plays Paul (McCartney) looks more like Paul than Paul looks like Paul now," explains Louise. "And the guy who plays Ringo, when I first heard him sing, I wondered if he had a recording of Ringo up his shirt."

With the band complete, the guys were ready to start assembling their set list and perfecting their live show. Louise wanted the group to have a vast knowledge of Beatles material so members could vary the show on a nightly basis. She says the ability to change the set list nightly was a luxury of which her brother always yearned for and was never allowed.

Now, as best they can, she and the Liverpool Legends plan to make up for it.

"One of the things George and I had talked about years and years ago was how much he didn't like to go on tour," she recalls. "All he got to do was dash on stage, play 10 songs and dash off. He didn't get to perform the repertoire of songs they had written, so when we started this band, we decided to do some of those songs."

The Liverpool Legends catalog consists of the B sides from multiple Beatles records, music from Beatles' solo careers as well as crowd favorites and radio hits.

"I wanted this to be an extensive variety of songs," says Louise. "It makes a lot of hard work for the guys, but they agree with me. If they have a really varied repertoire of songs, people can come three or four nights in a row to see them and hear different songs every night."

Aside from being stellar musicians and looking like their counterparts in The Beatles, Louise says she feels George would have approved of them.

"They're all really, really nice boys," she explains. "They are just like my brothers and I know the are the kind of guys George would like to know."

Louise readily admits that because there are so many Beatles tributes band out there right now, all of whom are not the most wholesome, it was important to her to work with players she felt perpetuated the beliefs members of Beatles thought important.

"George used to be concerned (about tribute bands)," says Louise. "He always said, 'It's hard enough for me to pretend to be me.' A lot of bands have a bad attitude; they get this big head and they behave less than gentlemanly while dressed in The Beatles outfits. I really tear into them. I tell them they can't act that way while dressed like that. They have to show some respect.

"(Tribute bands are supposed to be about) keeping The Beatles' music alive and keeping what The Beatles were about alive and if they are doing that, then that's a good thing."

Louise feels she found the perfect combination of musical talent, looks and personality with the assembly of the Liverpool Legends. But she still hopes fans of The Beatles will come out and judge the Liverpool Legends for themselves.

"The Illinois State Fair asked me if they could bill them as the No. 1 Beatles band," continues Louise. "I said, 'No, let the people decide. But you can say they are the only Beatles band endorsed by a family member.' Oh, I see my brother out the window. He's waiting for me. I have to go now."

Originally published June 30, 2005