These exclusive images show Jon’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra coming back to life in 1999 after nearly 30 years of involuntary ‘extinction’.
Working from Marco de Goeij‘s by-ear-reconstructed score, Jon and conductor Paul Mann spent the spring and summer of 1999 meticulously adjusting all the score pages in preparation for the two now legendary 30th anniversary performances at London’s Royal Albert Hall in September that year.
Paul Mann explains:
Pioneering pianist and composer Dave Brubeck has passed away on December 5, aged 91. His recordings include Take Five and Blue Rondo a la Turk, but he was also an important inspiration for Jon’s idea to compose Concerto for Group and Orchestra.
In this 2008 interview, Jon talks of his early fascination with Brubeck.
- Within six months of being at Drama School in London [in 1960], I’d met a Dutchman who played the clarinet for fun and we used to play together. By the end of the first year I’d formed a jazz group with piano, bass, drums, and clarinet. We played weird modern jazz.
We are delighted to announce that over the coming years, the vast majority of Jon Lord’s music scores will be published in new editions by Hal Leonard/EMI Music.
Each score has been painstakingly revised and edited by the conductor Paul Mann, whose close association with the composer ensures that the new material reflects his last known wishes in every detail.
The first to appear will be the long-awaited Concerto for Group and Orchestra, which is published for the first time in its definitive form, incorporating the many revisions that the composer made for the recent studio recording.
Next will be a new edition of Sarabande in Jon’s revised version for group and orchestra, which receives its first publication in any form.
Both works will be published for sale as study scores, with their corresponding performing material on hire, and will be available early next spring.
The other works will follow at regular intervals. Please keep an eye on jonlord.org for further details.
‘I don’t know of any other rock musicians of Jon’s stature who would be equally at home in handling musicians from leading symphony orchestras [than Jon].’
This is conductor Paul Mann interviewed by DPRP.net (Dutch Progressive Rock Page) about the new recording of Concerto for Group and Orchestra:
‘He vindicated that little vision that he had back in 69 in writing this piece some 43 years later because he just continued living it, he believed in it against a lot of odds and against a lot of people’s preconceptions he made it work This recording is our proof of that, it’s really the final vindication of that vision.’
Watch this freshly released promo clip for the Mediabook edition of Concerto for Group and Orchestra:
Mediabook edition includes Concerto CD + documentary DVD + 80-page book
“A valedictory for a man and his stubborn creative vision. Lord lived like he plays the B3 here, with a ferocious creativity. That same dogged sense of determination pushed him to continue working on this piece until he got it just right. This prog rock-meets-classical piece ends up sounding brand new, even for long-time Purple fans.”
Thus writes Something Else Reviews in their potent overview of Concerto for Group and Orchestra.
There is “a breath-taking clarity in the interactions of the orchestra, Lord and his chosen soloists”, and on the second movement “vocalists Balsamo and Kasia Laska add to the dark portent that initially surrounds this second movement, before Dickinson manages to match — and maybe even exceed — Bonamassa’s fiery intensity.”
“The concerto’s final third — Lord’s torrential “Vivace – Presto,” elicits a jaw-dropping sense of wonder.”
The eagerly awaited expanded edition of Jon’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra will be released on December 7, 2012.
Officially known as the Mediabook Edition, it comes with the standard CD of the Concerto plus a 72-page book and a documentary DVD.
Along with unseen photographs from the recording sessions, the book also contains Paul Mann‘s elaborate complete essay on the life and recording of the Concerto.
The book also contains Marco de Goeij‘s essay on how he struggled with his recreation of the Concerto and his initial meeting with Jon while he was on tour with Deep Purple. Marco de Goeij caught him outside his hotel in Rotterdam and remembers the crucial moment, when Jon first heard about the reconstructed score:
Jon Lord and Paul Mann during recording sessions for Concerto for Group and Orchestra, June 2012.
The Highway Star Deep Purple website has published a highly recommended in-depth interview with Jon’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra conductor Paul Mann.
The interview goes through many aspects of the new Concerto; from the choice of musicians, Jon’s illness, possible future recordings of Jon’s music to the pros of finally recording the Concerto in the studio:
