"From the moment Tony picked up a guitar he attracted the crowds and queues would form outside the Red Lion in St George's [parish] where people were desperate to hear him play.

In 1958, only two years after starting to play in the skiffle band which he formed, at age 18, he and another young rocker from Norwich, Kenny Packwood, began appearing live on the "Oh Boy!"

[9] In 1958 Johnny Foster sought to recruit Sheridan as a guitar player in Cliff Richard's backing band (soon renamed the Shadows), but after failing to find him at the 2i's Coffee Bar opted for another guitarist who was there, Hank Marvin.

"[13] Despite these successes, his penchant for being late, showing up without his guitar, etc., soon got him a reputation for having gone a bit "haywire", and cost him much of his professional standing in England.

Providentially, an offer for a gig came from Bruno Koschmider's "Kaiserkeller" club in Hamburg, West Germany for an English group to play there.

[1] Sheridan and others (including Colin "Melander" Crawley) joined an ad hoc group promptly dubbed "The Jets" and were put on the ship headed for Hamburg.

As fate would have it, legal woes (i.e. lack of proper papers) caused "The Jets" to not last long, but Sheridan (and now-friend Crawley) were soon back onstage in Hamburg.

[15] Ringo Starr briefly played in Sheridan's backing band during very early 1962, before returning to Rory Storm and the Hurricanes.

[16] When a colleague of German Polydor producer/A & R man Bert Kaempfert saw the pairing on stage, he suggested that Sheridan and the Beatles make some recordings together.

About his singing in the beginning of his career, mainly during the early period of his recordings with Polydor, it was often said that "Sheridan didn't have a lot of originality, his performances mostly channeling Elvis".

Additionally John Lennon, Pete Best and Tony Sheridan all swore that there were several other Beatles tracks that were recorded during the two-day session, but they have not surfaced.

[22] In the mid-1960s, Sheridan's musical style underwent a drastic transformation, away from his rock and roll roots and towards a more blues- and jazz-oriented sound.

The change was presaged by liner notes from his 1964 album, Just a Little Bit of Tony Sheridan, in which his musical preferences are listed as "jazz and classical" rather than rock.

[22] Due to the repeated shellings he experienced in Vietnam, Sheridan henceforth suffered from great sensitivity to the sounds of any kind of explosions, even fireworks.

In the early 1970s, he managed to cut a single as a pop duo, teamed with Carole Bell, and they toured Europe together with fair success.

Elvis Presley's TCB Band, not working at the time, was hired to play on the album along with top bassist (and former Hamburg friend) Klaus Voormann.

An album of rock classics plus a few country tunes resulted but, with no major label release, it was restricted to direct TV sales.

"His development as an artist and on a personal and spiritual level makes Vagabond an interesting departure that bona fide r’n’r that made his reputation on the Hamburg scene way back in the 60's.

[27] In 2002, the Argentinian rock musician Charly Garcia recorded his album Influencia,[28] on which Tony Sheridan contributed as a singer/guitarist on the song "I'm Not in Love".

[30] In 2003, Sheridan produced a DVD on which there was a 24 minutes video clip, where he gives us a guided tour of the St. Pauli district, showing us the main venues and places where himself, The Beatles and other musicians would perform, hang out and sleep when they played at the Star-Club, the Kaiserkeller and other clubs in Hamburg.

[35] The full set of the songs played on that night are found on the DVD of the event, entitled "CHANTAL meets Tony Sheridan - A Beatles Story".

(...) This CD (& DVD) is the audible and visual proof of how romantic the ballad "Why" can still sound today, that the stomping "Skinny Minnie" is still a highlight in Sheridan's song list, and how the traditional "The Saints" fairs in a vivid rock arrangement.

- Radio producer Martin Duffy [49] "Yes, Tony Sheridan was a genuinely talented performer, and the fledgling Beatles were lucky to meet him and learn from him.

But ironically, one of the greatest lessons which the Beatles learned from Tony's life, was to reproduce the opposite of what they saw from his habits: Be disciplined in rehearsing their music relentlessly, always arrive fully prepared... and on time.

demanded that we busy ourselves with the arrangements until the band leader was satisfied that the result came close to the required "TS" (Tony Sheridan) style - then it was alright!

- Ted "Kingsize" Taylor[55] Eventhough Tony Sheridan was extremely secretive about his personal life, in a 2010 radio documentary, he shared his painful childhood experience of his mother "dumping" him in a orphanage without a word, with no explanation: "My father disappeared by the time I came to my senses... My mother went to London to check on her relatives because of the [German] Blitz, and she came back pregnant.

The end result was that I finished up in this children's home, and I remember standing in this kid's bed, holding onto the railings and shaking them, and seeing my mother disappear down the ward.

His friend and former bassist Crawley stated that in 1960 Sheridan confided that despite his mixed Irish-Catholic and Jewish background, he was at that point viewing himself as a Buddhist.

In the later part of his life, Sheridan lived in Seestermühe, a village north of Hamburg, and in addition to music, he was interested in heraldry and designed coats of arms.