Jon Lord - Edinburgh 5th October 2009
David Meadows
it. It was just that good.
A bit of background, for those who don't know: this concert was a
collaboration between Jon Lord, the Royal Scottish Academy of Music, and
Stevenson College. The orchestra, and the rock band, was made up of music
students from those schools. It's the youngest orchestra I've ever seen.
Some of them looked about ten!
The first piece on the programme was an overture for the orchestra, "The
Mauchline Belles" by Kevin McCrae.
After than, a group of about twelve traditional musicians, young people led
by Phil Cunningham (mostly fiddles, with two guitars, two accordians, and
two bagpipes) joined the orchestra to play a set of reels and jigs. A
Scottish jig backed by the full power of orchestral brass and percussion is
quite amazing!
This first half of the concert lasted about half an hour. The second part
consisted of the Concerto For Group and Orchestra. But not in any form I
have ever heard before. The "group" was a rock band from Stevenson College
which consisted of vocalist, saxophone, bass, drums, keyboards, and two
guitar players. Jon Lord joined them on Hammond organ.
Obviously this made for a pretty unique arrangement of the solo parts, but
everything worked perfectly. You would never know that this wasn't the
"proper" arrangement.
And the band was astonishing. Again, all really young lads, but all of them
played superbly. The guitar players alternated solos and both of them seemed
good, but I did notice that one of them had paid more attention to the 1999
(Steve Morse) version of the Concerto when working out his solos! The first
movement guitar solo was extremely long, as was the third movemrnt drum
solo, and all the solos got spontaneous applause. The singer... the singer
was amazing, but more about him later. For now, I'll just say he has a good
voice with the right pitch to sing Gillan's part and he carried off the
second movement vocal with no trouble at all.
The orchestra (conducted by Paul Mann, who must be the world's leading
expert on this music, nice to see him up there again) worked incredibly
hard. This is apparently their FIRST WEEK at the college, and they've been
given a hour long modern concerto full of improvised solos to play. Talk
about being thrown in at the deep end! And if I was being totally honest and
critical, there were moments when you could hear that it wasn't a
professional, experience orchestra. But they were very minor moments and in
no way detractd from the enjoyment oy the performance. they played with
energy and enthusuiasm and the overall effect was outstanding.
And I've got to menton the rock group again because they were amazing! I
would seriously be interested to hear what kind of music they normally play,
because they are all hugely talented.
And the singer... ok... there was an encore.
I knew what the encore would be before Jon finished introducing it, and I
wondered if the singer could do it. Good voice in the Concerto, but would he
have the power to do......Child in Time?
Yes. He was unbeliveable. He just kept going up and up, and never lost a bit
of power, never even seemed to be struggling. I don't think I've heard a
voice as impressive as that since......well, about 1969 ;-)
When the concert ended, I felt shell-shocked. I was absolutely speechless.
Actually. I was in tears. I had no doubt the concert would be enjoyable...
at the very least, it would be "interesting"... but I really didn't expect
to come away so impressed. Best concert I've ever seen!
I am so happy that I was able to witness what will probably remain a unique
musical event. These young people should feel extremely proud of themselves
(and so should Jon and Paul).
--
David Meadows
http://www.heroes.force9.co.uk
Peter
I've been looking forward to your review for weeks and I wasn't
disappointment, you made me feel like jumping on a plane and travelling half
way around the world to see one of Jon's concerts myself...and to shake your
hand.
It's such a shame that a professional video of these concerts hasn't been
done, especially these truely unique ones with a bunch of "nobodys" that
turn out to be an almost life changing experience.
Thanks again mate,
Pete
"David Meadows" <da...@no.spam.here.co.uk> wrote in message
news:HJ-dnTZosNp2JFbX...@brightview.co.uk...
David Meadows
Elzee36
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oE4wmMOcihchttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5OuDMPb4tw
>
> --
> David Meadowshttp://www.heroes.force9.co.uk
THanks. Great review