On 1st October 2012, earMUSIC , the Hamburg based rock label part of Edel Group, releases the first studio recording of Jon Lord’s groundbreaking meeting of rock and classical music – “Concerto For Group And Orchestra”
Jon Lord of Deep Purple
‘Over these last years since leaving Deep Purple, I’ve played it over 30 times with different orchestras and conductors all over the world, and, of course, in 2000 I did it well over 30 times with Purple on the Concerto tour, so I’ve been honing the piece live on stage, and I’ve had the opportunity to change things in the score that weren’t sounding quite right. It is therefore a marvellous and exciting prospect to have the definitive recording of the definitive version of the score.’ (Jon Lord May 2012)
Jon Lord recorded the marvellous rhythm section – Guy Pratt (Pink Floyd, Madonna) & Brett Morgan (Jon Anderson, Sting) and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra (with whom Jon had recorded twice before) in June 2011 in Liverpool – conducted by Paul Mann. The production then moved to Abbey Road Studios in London to record Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson (on vocals with Steve Balsamo and Kasia Laska) and Joe Bonamassa, Darin Vasilev and Steve Morse on guitars.
Happily, Jon got to hear and approve the final mixes a few weeks before he passed away.
The family and earMUSIC decided to proceed with the release of the album in October as scheduled, as this seemed the best way to celebrate and pay tribute to Jon and his beautiful music. Thus this superb studio recording of ‘Concerto For Group And Orchestra’ is exactly the way Jon wanted us to hear it and will now hopefully become Jon’s legacy for generations to come.
JON LORD 1941 – 2012
