If I remember right, this was the announcement that opened the ELP show I saw in Vienna on May 17th, 1974 and the concert of Keith Emerson, Greg Lake and Carl Palmer was one to remember for a long time. And it was of course the title of a live triple album from the same year. I had followed Keith Emerson since his days with The Nice, whose album Five Bridges (1970) was the first LP I ever bought and ELP were one of my all-time favourite bands with their eclectic fusion of rock and classical music.
Now the show unfortunately did end with the passing of Keith Emerson, whose musical inventiveness and powerful compositions and arrangements of classical pieces will not be forgotten. Neither his great showmanship, with his organ set on fire and treated with knifes, jump upon but always creating amazing and captivating music. Rest In Peace!
Nana Vasconcelos was probably one of the most amazing percussionists working in improvised music – his own recordings or his contributions to the music of Pat Metheny, Don Cherry, Egberto Gismonti and many others are proof of that – but for me his biggest contribution to jazz and world music came with the group CODONA, featuring Don Cherry and Collin Walcott beside him. They recorded 3 albums for ECM in the years 1979 to 1983 and all three are little masterpieces, with Codona 2 still my favourite. I was lucky to see them perform at the Saalfelden Jazz Festival in Austria in 1981 and it is one of these unforgettable musical moments – magical in many ways, touching my innermost feelings and letting me enjoy music on a different individual level – spiritual and emotional. The death of Collin Walcott in a car crash in Germany in 1984 set an abrupt end to this group, but the recordings are still beauty in sound. Rest in Peace, Nana Vasconcelos.
