Saluting the lads from Liverpool.

• Position: What's New? - Book Review

Forty years ago, a photographer packed his cameras and suitcase and drove from London to Bournemouth to meet the Beatles. "Their took was original--suite unlike most pop stars of the time. John [Lennon] asked me what I had n mind. I said the purpose of my trip was just to meet them, and if the rapport between us was good to take some informal portraits.... By the end of the next day the cover for 'With the Beatles' was done."

In the wake of the 40th anniversary of the band's first album as well as their arrival in the U.S., Big Tent Entertainment, New York, has published The Beatles." A Private View ($60) by Robert Freeman, who was the official photographer for the Fab Four in their early years and the designer of their first five album covers, including "With the Beatles."

He is the photographer and designer most closely associated with the band--having traveled with the group from 1963-66. Besides "With the Beatles" (1963), Freeman's other album cover designs were for "A Hard Day's Night" (1964), "Beatles for Sale" (1964), "Rubber Soul" (1965), and "Help!" (1965). He also designed the covers for John Lennon's two books, In...