McCartney says meditation stabilized Beatles

By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The surviving members of the Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, will perform at a concert on Saturday to raise funds to help children learn a meditation technique McCartney said helped stabilise the band at the height of its fame.

McCartney and Starr will perform separate sets at the "Change Begins Within" concert for the David Lynch Foundation, which helps people learn Transcendental Meditation.

The Beatles helped popularize Transcendental Meditation -- described as a simple mental technique that combats stress -- in 1967 when they sought spiritual guidance from an Indian guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

"It was a great gift that Maharishi gave us," McCartney told a news conference on Friday to promote the concert. "For me, it came at a time when we were looking for something to kind of stabilise us towards the end of the crazy '60s."

"It's a lifelong gift. It's something you can call on at any time," he said. "I think it's a great thing it's actually coming into the mainstream."

Starr also described Transcendental Meditation as a gift and that since learning it more than 40 years ago "sometimes a lot and sometimes a little I have meditated."

The lineup for the concert at famed Radio City Music Hall also includes Sheryl Crow, Donovan, Pearl Jam singer Eddie Vedder, blues-folk musician Ben Harper and techno star Moby.

Filmmaker David Lynch's foundation says that since 2005 it has provided scholarships for more than 100,000 at-risk young people, teachers and parents in 30 countries to learn Transcendental Meditation.