Lennon DVD Bittersweet For Yoko

Compiling 'Lennon Legend' One Of Hardest Things She's Done

(AP)  Yoko Ono says compiling a new DVD of her late husband John Lennon's solo work was one of the hardest jobs she's ever had to do.

The disc, "Lennon Legend," features 20 of the murdered Beatle's songs, illustrated with a mix of restored promo clips, new animation and previously unseen footage of the couple in public and in private.

"It was very hard for me to work on this, because there were many footages that reminded me of my life with John," Ono told the audience at a preview screening in London on Tuesday. "Sometimes it made me feel less professional about it, and I wondered if I could go through it."

As executive producer of the disc, Ono, 70, helped comb through video tapes, home movies and newsreels for footage of the couple in performance, at home in New York City and at the beach.

Ono is ever-present in the footage, much of it showing tender moments between the pair. The Japanese-born artist, who married Lennon in 1969 as The Beatles were disintegrating, dominated the last decade of his life — to the chagrin of many Beatles fans. She was at his side for the 1969 "Bed In" for peace, marched with him against the Vietnam War and performed with him in the Plastic Ono Band.

Since Lennon's murder by deranged fan Mark David Chapman on Dec. 8, 1980, Ono has been a dedicated guardian of the musician's legacy. She has launched a peace prize in his name and posted billboards in New York, London and Tokyo bearing a line from Lennon's "Imagine": "Imagine all the people living life in peace." Last year she bought Lennon's childhood home in Liverpool and donated it to a British conservation body.

"Lennon Legend," companion to a 1998 album of the same name, includes footage of the Bed In and Lennon performing "Imagine" in his last live performance, at a London concert in 1975.

The songs include stalwarts such as "Imagine," "Give Peace a Chance" and "Working Class Hero," 70s tracks including "Jealous Guy" and "Whatever Gets You Thru the Night" and several songs from Lennon's final album, "Double Fantasy."

Dedicated fans will appreciate the crisp color of the images and the surround-sound quality of the remastered songs.

Casual fans may judge Lennon's solo work, with a few exceptions, less enduring than many Beatles songs. But they are likely to be moved by some of the footage: Lennon signing autographs and clowning around in New York; Lennon and Ono in Central Park two weeks before he was gunned down outside their nearby apartment building.

An elegiac new video for "Working Class Hero" — one of Lennon's most powerful and personal songs — includes footage of Lennon's childhood home in Liverpool, newsreel clips of the Fab Four and images of candlelight vigils that followed the musician's death.

"John laid his life on the line," Ono said. "His life was a very driven one, a very compressed one. In his very short life, he did a lot for us."