• AllMyVinyl #48
• Band: Jon Lord
• Album Title: Concerto for Group & Orchestra
• Release Date: ? Oct 2012
• Date purchased: N/A
• Location purchased: Record label contact
• Color of vinyl: black
• Number of discs: 2
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

This one is a weird beast (for me).  First off, this is the 2012 release of the album from Jon Lord on his own.  This was first put out in 1969 by Deep Purple itself.  It was the first release after Ian Gillan had joined the band – it came between the self titled 1969 album with Rod Evans and the 1970 album (Made in Rock) with Gillan.   From everything I’ve read about this, it was a pet project for Jon Lord, who was into this kind of music.   The name “for group and orchestra” tends to lead more towards the orchestra part than the “group” part.  At least that’s my take on it.  As it was originally written for Deep Purple, there are bits of “rock” in here for sure.  But the bulk of it seems to be more orchestra based.  That’s mostly why it didn’t do much for me originally.  I remember when I originally discovered Purple it was LONG after Mk I (as well as II, III, & IV) had expired.  So when I dug into their past and found out about this one, I thought “What the hell is this?”  I do recall listening to it back in the day, but back then I just wanted to hear shit like “Child in Time”, so I tuned this out.   I did later find it was a thing that was a big deal to Lord, and I respect that.  But it didn’t do anything for me musically.

Fast forward in time, and Jon Lord has retired from Deep Purple.  In 2011, he remounts the orchestra and plays it in full live with several of his friends – and of course an orchestra.  Because you can’t really play this without one.  Some of the friends are people I know from elsewhere.  Bruce Dickinson from Iron Maiden, Joe Bonamassa from Black Country Communion, Guy Pratt from Pink Floyd, and Steve Morse who was still in Deep Purple at this time.  There are others, but they’re not known to me.   Anyway, he played this and recorded it in 2011, and set about putting out the album in 2012, except, Lord died before that happened.  He left us on 26 Jul 2012, and this didn’t come out until October 2012.   The liner notes say he did hear the final mix of the album two days before he died, so he did know about it, but didn’t live to see its release.

The tunes are a like one giant piece of music. While there are breaks because you have to flip discs, it listens as one really long song with various changes and whatnot.  To that, I’m not going to get into things I usually talk about – the beat, or the guitar solo for the most part.  I’m not enough of an expert on this kind of music to differentiate, but I will say this.  It had peaks and valleys.  Most of the peaks are what you’d call the “group” part – where the rock band part takes over and it rocks out.  There’s parts that are super quiet, and parts that sound straight from an Opera.  There’s moments when the guitar solos were really great, but they don’t last super long, and you’re back into orchestral stuff.  I know my writing about it is odd, but I’m having issues classifying this to be honest.  That’s not to say it’s bad, it isn’t.  Just not my usual cup of tea, and as such isn’t something I know a lot about how to write.

With one exception. When I was listening, I didn’t know about Side 4, and thought “Man, this song at the end of Side 3” is really great.  It’s loud, it’s got power, and blends the orchestra and the band REALLY well in a way that nothing else on the album did.  Then when I realized that Side 4 was just an interview with Jon about the concerto (from inception in 69 till now), it made more sense, I was hearing the finale. ha.  But overall, an enjoyable enough piece of music – but definitely not something I would find myself listening to a bunch of times.

My copy here (which I left to the bottom as it’s not really that big of a deal here, IMO) was something that I didn’t buy.  When this came out I was very friendly with a label rep from the label that put this out, and he sent it to me on vinyl.  Now in 2012, I was definitely NOT collecting vinyl, so it never got played – didn’t have a record player then, but I kept it.  At one point I almost gave it away, but I didn’t.  Kept it, and finally today got to listen to it in full.  I don’t actually own the Deep Purple version, and honestly, I probably won’t ever get that, as I have this.  I did enjoy it.

Perhaps I should listen to the Purple version to compare.