Reimagining the Classics: 6. Prog Rock Part 2 – Emerson, Lake and Palmer
by David Barker
The titan of prog rock adaptations of classical music was unquestionably the “supergroup” Emerson Lake and Palmer, henceforth abbreviated as ELP, which numbers at least ten works in their catalogue in this genre. In case you are wondering what defines a supergroup, it is one where the members already had successful careers, either solo or in other notable groups. In a future article in this series, I will cover the work of another supergroup, Sky, which included John Williams (the guitarist) and Herbie Hancock.
I have already discussed keyboardist Emerson’s career in The Nice, where his interest in this genre began. Greg Lake was guitarist and vocalist in the English group King Crimson, one of the more prominent prog rock groups of the late 1960s; it certainly had a bigger reputation than The Nice at the time, and indeed to this day. The Nice and King Crimson were booked to play concerts together in San Francisco at the end of 1969 and Emerson and Lake, each dissatisfied with their respective situations, renewed their acquaintance and discussed seriously the idea of forming a group of their own. The Nice split up a few months later, and Lake left King Crimson soon after. Various drummers were auditioned, including Carl Palmer, at that point a member of Atomic Rooster. Palmer was initially reluctant to leave as Atomic Rooster was just starting to become well-known, but Emerson and Lake persevered and by mid-August, the trio was performing in public. It was their second concert that really brought them to the public’s attention, playing in front of an estimated 600,000 at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival. This was a legendary event, featuring the likes of Jimi Hendrix, The Who, The Doors, Miles Davis, Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell and the Moody Blues. At one point, there was a rumour that Jimi Hendrix would join the group, thus creating HELP, but apparently it was never going to happen.
The band’s first album, which was self-titled, was released in late 1970 (it was recorded before they even performed in public), and included The Barbarian, an instrumental piece based on Bartók’s piano piece Allegro Barbaro, and Knife-Edge, a vocal piece, using the first movement from Janáček’s Sinfonietta, with a central keyboard solo based on the Allemande from Bach’s French Suite No. 1.
ELP expected the label to credit Bartók for The Barbarian, but that didn’t happen. Depending on which Wikipedia page you read, either Bartók’s widow Ditta contacted the band to ask that this be corrected, or had to sue them before it was changed. For the most part, it is a hard-driven piece which sounds like any early 70s heavy rock piece until you reach the central solo piano section which quotes the original fairly directly. I can’t say that it does much for me, but then again, neither does Bartók.
Knife-Edge, which includes lyrics by Greg Lake, has a greater depth musically than The Barbarian, but that reflects the difference between the two original works. Bartók’s is intended to be primitive and barbaric, Janáček’s celebratory and inspirational. It is a very effective arrangement, where the original is certainly recognisable, but Keith Emerson’s array of keyboards is given full rein. As incongruous as it might seem, the Bach Allemande on organ flows seamlessly from the Janáček. One source I read said that this too had crediting issues. This is definitely one for the playlist.
Emerson Lake Palmer (the album) attained gold status in both the UK and the USA, peaking at No. 4 in the UK charts. The next album, Tarkus, released in 1971, was more successful commercially in the USA, but contains no classical music-derived works, so we will move on to the next album, released also in 1971, which is almost entirely an adaptation of a classical work. Pictures at an Exhibition, based on Mussorgsky’s original work for piano, was recorded live at the City Hall in Newcastle-on-Tyne on March 26, 1971.
It is not a complete arrangement of the original, running for 38 minutes, with some movements missing and three new pieces added. The Sage has Greg Lake by himself on acoustic guitar with some suitably psychedelic lyrics, while Blues Variations is twelve-bar blues using some of the material from The Old Castle, as well as borrowing from a piece by The Nice. The Curse of Baba Yaga takes some of what was originally named The Hut on Fowl’s Legs (but here called The Hut of Baba Yaga) and gives it the full ELP treatment.
Promenade appears three times, opening the work on the hall’s pipe organ, then as the third track on Emerson’s Hammond organ with some vocalising by Lake, and then a full band version following Blues Variations. My pick of the movements is The Hut of Baba Yaga, which was split into two parts, separated by Curse of Baba Yaga. It has brilliant driving energy, led (of course) by Emerson’s keyboards.
The big finish is, of course, The Great Gates of Kiev, (the plural is the band’s decision, not my typo) which has vocals and lyrics contributed by Greg Lake. Surprisingly, it isn’t all that big, when one compares it to the original or Ravel’s orchestration, and Lake’s voice sounds strained in places.
As an encore (and included on the album), ELP performed Nut Rocker, a version of the March from Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker. This was not an original arrangement by ELP, but rather an adaptation of a 1962 hit single by B Bumble and The Stingers. It is a lightweight piece, made marginally better by ELP, but the rinky-tink piano brought to mind the theme from the 1970s BBC snooker show Pot Black and also The Two Ronnies.
The band returned to the studio in late 1971, working on the next album, Trilogy, which would be released in 1972, and is regarded by some, including Greg Lake, as their best. It was certainly their most complex in terms of overdubs, to the point where some of the tracks were not able to be played live. For this article, the main interest is Hoedown, an arrangement of the respective movement from Aaron Copland’s ballet Rodeo. There were no credit issues this time; Copland was asked for his permission (unlike Bartók and Janáček, Copland was still alive). The piece has terrific energy, driven along by Carl Palmer’s drumming. The album also contains a track titled Fugue, but it is not based on a classical piece, but rather an original Emerson composition. It was ELP’s best-selling album, reaching Number 5 in the US and Number 2 in the UK.
The following year saw the next studio album, Brain Salad Surgery (no, I don’t know what it means either), which included a version of Parry’s Jerusalem and Toccata, based on the fourth movement of Alberto Ginastera’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Jerusalem was released as a single, but was banned from BBC radio for being “irreverent” and thus failed to sell. The band were proud of it – Carl Palmer said later that “We thought it was an unbelievable piece of music. It actually summed up prog rock, British prog rock, in that moment in time. It had everything. It was so grand, it was so English, and it was absolutely perfect for the voice.” I should say that I can’t find the original source for this quote, but it is repeated multiple times across various blogs and forums. Like Hoedown, it is faithful to the original, does not go “over the top” with extended solos, and Greg Lake’s vocals are pure.
Toccata is also faithful to the wild, driving rhythms of Ginastera’s original, which also features a lot of keyboard and percussion. There is a long solo for Carl Palmer in the middle, which doesn’t do much for me, and when Emerson’s keyboards return, it sounds like something out of a 1960s Doctor Who. Not a favourite of mine, but I can certainly see how this would be very exciting in concert.
ELP released a second live album in 1974, Welcome Back, My Friends, to the Show That Never Ends, Ladies and Gentlemen, which included versions of Hoedown, Jerusalem and Toccata. The band then had a two year break from performing and recording.
It would be another three years before the next studio album, the rather banally titled Works Volume 1, appeared. It included an original piano concerto by Emerson, and three adaptations of classical works, the best known (and best) being Fanfare for the Common Man. Again, permission was sought from the composer, who had been very happy with Hoedown. Initially, ELP’s manager Stewart Young approached Copland’s publisher who said no, but Young persisted, and spoke to Copland directly. He asked for a recording, and then rang back with his approval, saying “This is brilliant, this is fantastic”.
The album version is almost ten minutes long, with conventional (for prog rock) versions of the original bookending an extended middle section which can be regarded as a cadenza. It is, to say the least, eccentric and unsurprisingly bemused Aaron Copland. Of all their works, I feel that Fanfare best shows off the talents of all three members of the band. The powerful driving rhythm of Greg Lake’s bass is wonderful. A trimmed-down version (minus the cadenza) was released as a single, and reached Number 2 in the UK.
Remarkably, what appears on the LP is a single take, and not only that, the first take. Greg Lake recalled in a 1993 interview for Guitar World that “Keith was playing it as a piece of classical music. I played this shuffle bass line behind him and all of a sudden it started to connect. Then Carl came in and we three started to play it. Luckily, the engineer had a two-track running, and that is what’s on the record – the first time we played through the piece.”
One of Bach’s Two-Part Inventions appears in an arrangement by Carl Palmer for xylophone with subtle keyboard accompaniment, while The Enemy God Dances With the Black Spirits (for the whole band) has all the menace and energy of its original, The Enemy God from Prokofiev’s Scythian Suite.
Works Volume 1 is a double album, and while it reached gold record status in the USA and UK, it didn’t have quite the success that the quality of its music deserved. Studio double albums are often like that, but in this case, there was another reason: prog rock had had its day, and 1977 was the year that both disco and punk arrived.
ELP released two more studio albums – Works Volume 2 (1977) and Love Beach (1979) – neither of which included classical adaptations, and then the band recognised the inevitable and broke up. It reformed a couple of times, and at a 1997 concert in Montreux, Switzerland (a recording was released in 2015), a nineteen minute medley that began with Fanfare, which then blended into an instrumental version of O Fortuna from Orff’s Carmina Burna and finished with Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D. It is absolutely full on, though the fifty-something Emerson and Lake do get a breather in the middle while Palmer does a five minute drum solo.
They played a 40th anniversary concert in London in 2010. Sadly, in 2016, the band lost two of its members: Keith Emerson committed suicide and Greg Lake died of cancer.
