Macca reunited with iconic missing bass he played at town hall gig

THE 51-year search for Paul McCartney's missing Beatles bass guitar – the ‘Holy Grail of rock music’, which he played at an Abergavenny Town Hall gig over 60 years ago – is the subject of a special documentary now being screened on BBC iPlayer.

The Fab Four played Lydney Town Hall in the Forest of Dean on August 31, 1962, four days before recording their first hit single Love Me Do at Abbey Road.

And more famously, and now huge stars, they fulfilled a contract to play Abergavenny Town Hall on June 22, 1963, John Lennon flying in by helicopter after appearing on a live edition of Juke Box Jury.

An 18-year-old Paul bought the iconic violin-shaped Hofner bass from a music shop in Hamburg in 1961 for about £30, and went on to play it at more than 250 Cavern gigs in Liverpool before recording huge global hits like Love Me Do, All My Loving and She Loves You with the instrument.

Given an updated model by Hofner at the height of Beatlemania in later 1963, the older model then literally became second fiddle, appearing on stage as a back-up if needed, and was last spotted on camera in 1969’s Let It Be sessions.

And three years later, while recording with Wings in London, it mysteriously disappeared with other music equipment from a van parked in Ladbroke Grove.

Even the fact of how it went missing had been lost in the mists of time when a "Trace the Bass” campaign backed by Paul was launched to try and track it down some seven years ago – it had seemingly vanished into thin air.

Then amazingly, following years of dogged detective work from a team headed by Hofner's Nick Wass and global appeals in the media, a woman appeared in 2023 at the gates of Paul's Sussex house with a Hofner bass that had been stored for years in her loft.

Rehearsing in LA for a US tour, Paul was shown a photo and recognised it immediately, excitedly saying “Oh, my baby. It’s my bass!"

And the new documentary, shows him reunited with the iconic instrument after its full restoration and delightedly playing it for the first time in more than half a century.

Rewind nearly 64 years, and a couple of hundred excited locals had packed into Lydney Town Hall to see the less well known but “Sensational”-billed Beatles, who stayed overnight at the Feathers Hotel, now the site of the town’s Tesco.

Intriguingly, a Ringo Starr Beatles suit was sold at auction in the 1990s with a receipt in the pocket from the nearby Silver Fox Café “for egg, chips, bread, butter and tea”, where presumably John, Paul, George and Ringo had grabbed some grub.

Momentum was gathering for the Mop Tops, who had toured with the likes of Roy Orbison, and were on the cusp of rocking the world.

And just 10 months later, and with Paul still playing the original Hofner, they winged in to Abergavenny as chart topping stars to play for 600 screaming fans, manager Brian Epstein insisting they honour the £250 contract signed before fame arrived.

Watch McCartney: The Lost Bass on BBC iPlayer.