• Keith Emerson - An Exclusive Interview
• Equipment Details
• Emerson's Modular Moog
• Aaron Copland On The ELP Version Of 'Fanfare For The Common Man'

      In late 1969, Keith met bassist/vocalist Greg Lake, then of King Crimson, in San Francisco where the two were playing on the same bill. Both were dissatisfied with the bands they were in, and each liked the other's playing. The two joined musical forces and began their search for the proper drummer. Carl Palmer of Atomic Rooster was their choice, and so was formed Emerson, Lake & Palmer -- ELP for short.
      To date, the group has released seven LPs: Emerson, Lake & Palmer (Cotillion, distributed by Atlantic, SD 9040), Tarkus (Cotillion, SD 9903), Pictures at an Exhibition (Cotillion, SD 66666), Brain Salad Surgery (Manticore, MC66669), Welcome Back My Friends to the Show that Never Ends, Ladies and Gentlemen, Emerson, Lake & Palmer (Manticore, MC-3-200), and Works, Vol. 1 (Atlantic, SD-2-7000).
      Works, Vol. 1 has been the subject of much talk among the followers of ELP, because of the extensive use of an orchestra throughout the album. Many feel that the band is smothered behind the lavish strings and brass, while others find those elements pleasant additions to the ELP sound. Another radical move on the album was Emerson's forsaking his Hammond organ and modular Moog synthesizer, the latter of which had been the first to use in a live performance situation. Instead he chose to use Yamaha's mammoth $50,000 polyphonic synthesizer the GX-1 and a Steinway grand piano.

      In the early spring of 1977, the group mounted a tour which included a 59-piece orchestra, 6 vocalists, 19 technicians, 6 roadies, and others, for a total of 115 people. It was the largest touring production ever attempted in a rock context. However, by mid-summer the group was forced to drop the orchestra for financial reasons.
      The following text was compiled from interviews which took place on three different occasions. The first was in Montreal where the band was rehearsing for its 1977 tour. The second was in an airplane between Montreal and New York while Keith was traveling to purchase a piano for the tour. And the third was by phone while the tour was in progress. Emerson is shy and modest, yet very jovial, and seemingly quite unaffected by his superstardom. His I'm-just-a-regular-guy composure is nearly enough to make you forget that his accomplishments include such minutiae as walking away with top honors in five of the seventeen categories in CK's first annual Readers' Poll.

      What made you decide to start using the Yamaha GX-1?
      I heard about it through the Manticore office. I'm always very skeptical about these new keyboards that are coming out because there are thousands of them these days, and I've seen a load of them. And tried them. But with the Yamaha, I was dubious about what they said it could do and everything. At first I didn't think any more about it. I just said, "Look, fine. I'll try it out same as I've tried all the others." So about a week later my office rang me up and said, "We've got it set up at the studio and it's incredible. Come along and play it." So I got there and these two Japanese gentlemen were looking over it very excitedly. They explained to me what it did. I got more and more wrapped up in it as I went along. I'd be doing something and they'd say, "How do you do that? How do you do that? Hang on a second. That's great. How do I do that again?" It's got thousands of operations things on it. It's got drawers that pull out to alter the waves and all kinds of other things. The thing about the keyboard itself is that the touch is feather-light. I don't like that at all, I like to feel I've got some weight. I tried to get Chris Young, my roadie, to weight it by putting lead under the keys and heavying the springs, but the pivot of the keys isn't such that it could take the stress. But I said, "This is fantastic, I'd like to use it a bit more." They let me have it for about a week and then they had to take it away for a music show. In the meantime I found out how much it cost, which was a bit of a shock. But I played nothing else after I got it. I mean I didn't have the organ set up for a long time. In fact, I didn't use the organ or the Moog synthesizer setup on the group side of Works. That's all Yamaha. That just shows how much I liked it. I didn't need anything else, it's such a complete instrument.

      So you're completely happy with it?
      There's still room for a lot of improvement on it. I don't think it sounds thick enough, it doesn't have that Moog sound. I was discussing it with [Polymoog designer] Dave Luce, and I said, "Now if only I could get that Moog sound in the Yamaha." And Luce said he had designed an instrument like the GX-1, but the price was so high that it just wouldn't do them any good. I think the Moog people are into bringing out keyboards which are within everybody's budget. The difference between the Moog and the Yamaha is basically in the filter bank. That's what Dave told me, anyway.

      Have you thought of adding a Moog filter bank to it?
      You could, but it would be a hell of a job. We've already done some adding on to the instrument. We're lucky to have an excellent technician, Nick Rose. He has literally pulled the GX-1 apart and worked out all the components and everything. I think he knows more about the instrument than Yamaha does. Nick has found a way of adding a third oscillator bank to the instrument, which was something I wanted done. That was quite a job and it took a long time, but it didn't make that much difference. Yamaha said it wasn't possible. Another things is that the oscillators work in such a way that when you press a note eight times, it cycles around eight different oscillators or something, so that all eight need to be tuned. Nick managed to design something that can be added to it that tunes it in five seconds.

      How are you amplifying the Yamaha?
      All these electronic questions could be answered by Nick and Chris. [Ed. Note: See interview with Chris Young on page 26.] IT goes into a mixer and comes out somewhere else [laughs]. I don't really get too involved. I don't use the speakers that Yamaha provides, although they're good. They're not sufficient for what I need.

      Okay, let's go in a different direction. When did you first start playing organ?
      I was about 18, I think. I got fed up with playing pianos with the hammers broken off of them. That seems to be a fairly typical thing that happens to players. I saved up for about two years and bought the L-100.

      Did your technique change to fit the organ?
      Yes, it did. I realized it was obvious that you couldn't do all of the styles that you could do on the piano, so it was a bit limiting. Unless you're playing in a classical style on the organ, there's really no other use for the left hand. It gets a bit too boggy. You've got to comp with it. It is not as challenging as playing the piano.

      When did you add the C-3 to your setup?
      It was about 1968, I think. It was always the L-100 before that.

      What gave you the idea of using the two organs together?
      Well, at that particular time I was into throwing the L-100 around and making it feed back. I had developed this stage act at the time and it seemed to go down quite well. I couldn't do that with the C-3, you see, and it was a necessary part of the act at the time. I liked the C-3 sound. It was far superior and the octave range was greater than on the L's.

      How did you get the L-100 to feed back?
      It would feed back from being so close to the onstage speakers if you switched the L-100 off, because it had speakers in it. And using a fuzz box exaggerated the effect even more. By altering the direction between the speakers in the L-100 and the onstage speakers I'd get various howling noises.

      Did Jimi Hendrix have any influence on your use of feedback at the organ?
      Yeah, very much so. I did a tour with him, actually. He had bought himself a home movie camera, and whenever we were playing I'd see him looking between the amps, filming. He was always there. He loved the act. When he'd gotten his films developed there was a hysterical laughter coming from his dressing room. I poked my head around the corner to se what all the laughter was about, and they were running the film of me doing the bit with the organs. They were speeding up the film and running it backwards -- it was all completely stupid. Hendrix was great. Bus as far as that early stage act went, there was an organ player in London by the name of Don Shin. I don't know where he is today. He was a weird looking guy, really strange. A very twittery sort of character. He had a schoolboy's cap on, round spectacles, really stupid. I just happened to be in this club when he was playing. He had an L-100. the audience -- you know there were a lot of younger chicks down at the Marquee -- were all in hysterics. Giggling and laughing at him. No one was taking him seriously. And I said, "Who is this guy?" He'd been drinking whiskey out of a teaspoon and all kinds of ridiculous things. He'd play an arrangement of a Grieg Concerto, and I'd already played things like that with the Nice, the Brandenburg and all [from Ars Longa Vita Brevis]. So my ears perked up. Somebody else was doing these things. Playing it really well, and he got a fantastic sound from the L-100. But halfway through he sort of shook the L-100, and the back of it dropped off. Then he got out a screwdriver and started making adjustments while he was playing. Everyone was roaring their heads off laughing. So I looked and said, "Hang on a minute! That guy has got something." He and Hendrix were controlling influences over the way I developed the stage act side of things. Nobody really went for the organ in those days. The L-100 looked like a piece of furniture. I think Georgie Fame was the first to use it in England, and Graham Bond came along doing a heavier sort of thing. But most people's reaction to seeing an organ in the band was, "Yuk." I mean, people hated the sound of it. What I wanted to do was change people's image of that, make the organ sound more attractive. It didn't look that good, and the player usually sat at the instrument, so it didn't have any visual appeal at all. I guess seeing Don Shin made me realize that I'd like to compile an act from what he did. A lot of people hated it, said it was totally unnecessary. They thought that was all I could do. Some people still think that.

      There's a story that Hendrix was going to be a part of ELP. Is that true?
      Well, it was one thing which was suggested by [drummer] Mitch Mitchell when the band was first forming. Unfortunately, the press got hold of it and blew it up. They made all sorts of speculations. Their imaginations ran wild. At the time, Greg and I were talking with Mitch about joining us. He was happy with the suggestion, and he said, "Well, I'm seeing Hendrix tonight, maybe we could ask him to join too." Mitch said Hendrix thought a lot of my playing, and I told him the feeling was mutual. I thought it would be fantastic, although I was a bit skeptical about it. I thought Hendrix might take the attention away from me -- I'm a bit of an egomaniac. If Hendrix had been interested, though, I'd have given it a go.

      Has there been any other guitar player you've wanted to work with?
      I was really put off with guitarists when I was with the Nice. In the early days I didn't have too much equipment, and the guitar player was always too damn loud. I'm a bit wary of guitarists. The only one that I really wanted to work with after David O'List left the Nice was Steve Howe. He came and auditioned and was very talented. We begged him to join. He hemmed and hawed at that. The first day he said yes, but then he said he had an offer to start his own band and couldn't join us. I don't know whatever happened to that. He disappeared for two or three years. Next thing I heard, he was with Yes. He was the only guitar played I ever wanted to work with, and I got so used to working without one I was dubious of getting back and working with guitar players after that. I was willing to take the risk with Hendrix, though.

      The L-100 and the C-3 have a slightly different sound. Do you make use of that difference?
      No, not really. Occasionally I'll use my left hand on the L-100 and my right on the C-3. There's no percussion on the lower manual of the C, and in things like Tarkus it's useful to play the ostinato on the upper manual of the L-100 with the percussion on and also play the upper manual on the C-3 with the percussion on. You get more distinction. If you'd done that on just one organ, the percussion wouldn't happen.

      What drawbar and percussion settings do you use on the Hammonds?
      It's pretty standard. My favorite is the first three drawbars pulled full out with the percussion on the third harmonic. The vibrato is chorale 3. Depending on the acoustics of the hall, I'll add a slight touch of the top drawbar. I like a tacky-sounding organ. One that spits a bit, you know. I'm still searching for the ideal organ sound. It's still a bit too hard at the moment.

      How much did jazz organists influence your sound?
      Well, it was the Jack McDuff organ sound that really turned me on. I really didn't like the Jimmy Smith organ sound, though I liked what he did. But I worked for ages trying to get the sound that Jack McDuff got on the Rock Candy Live in the Front Room [out of print] album. It starts off with a very husky soort of black voice saying, "Presenting jazz organist Brother Jack McDuff!" with dubbed-in applause and then an amazing sort of tacky, spitty sounding organ. I think it must have been a freak of the recording. I found the sound by pure accident. You use a Marshall amplifier with the presence and treble turned full up. It exaggerates the contact sound. Lately, I've got a much cleaner sound, but I still like an element of click.

      How did you get the screaming chorus effect on the organ on "Jerusalem"?
      That was double-tracked and the second organ was put through a flanger. I tried to develop and electronic thing which would produce that effect live. It would accept the direct signal and split it in two. One signal would remain straight and the other would go just a fraction out of tune to give the organ a ringing sound. It worked okay and sounded all right, but there were all kinds of side noises. The people who were making it never perfected it. I wanted to use that on the piano also, so you could go straight from a honky-tonk piano to a normal piano sound. I think there are things on the market that do that now --[Eventide] Harmonizers. All these technical questions! I just concentrate on what I've got at my fingertips. Once it gets beyond that, I use my ears and tell Chris and Nick what's wrong and what's right. Then they fix it. I just dish out the money [laughs]. "Oh, we got so and so? Great. Bring it in. Don't tell me what it cost, don't tell me what it is, I'll try it."

      How do you go about re-arranging tunes by classical composers?
      I sit down with the score. As far as Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man," on Works, goes, it needed transposing, so I did that first. I wanted to improvise in a key that was sort of bluesy. I ended up in E. The rest of it was straightforward, really. You know, in order to get the shuffle sound, the timing needed to be changed, but it was common sense.

      What about earlier things like "The Barbarian"?
      That was taken from Bartok's Allegro Barbaro. There were a few timing things that needed to be changed to fit what we were doing there. Ginastera's First Piano Concerto, fourth movement, which we called "Toccata" on Brain Salad Surgery, was about the most complicated piece we did. I had to go through the whole thing and condense it, to bring out the parts of it that I thought were the most important. Of course, we couldn't do exactly the way Ginastera had written it because all of it uses the whole keyboard on the piano. So those bits I got the synthesizer to do. Ginastera loved it when I took it along to him. He made some comment that that was exactly how his music should always sound. And the same with Copland. In fact, I've got a tape of what Copland thinks of our version "Fanfare for the Common Man." [Ed. Note: For a transcription of that tape, see page 30.] This always pleases me, because I don't want to adulterate the music of anything.

      How do you orchestrate your keyboard parts?
      You mean what music is to be played on what instrument? I don't know. I invariably start with the piano. From there on it'll go out either to the organ or to another instrument. It depends on how it sounds and on what the original intention is for the piece. If I'm pretty convinced it is going to be, say, a piano concerto, or it's going to be for ELP, then that will determine what instruments I'll use. Sometimes I've got that in mind before I start. I swap around for variety. I may have been playing one line on the organ for a long time and just by way of change I'll play it on the Yamaha.

      Where did your interest in arranging other people's music come from?
      Simple reason -- I like the tunes. I want to play these tunes, but I want to play them in a way that's acceptable to our audience. And stimulate new interest in the original. You know I started doing this back in the Sixties, and that was my intention. But obviously since that time, audiences have become far more perceptive -- intelligent. One doesn't really have to do that now. I think people are going for classical music as much as for any other form. You wouldn't have had your Chick Coreas five years ago. Chick Corea doesn't have to really dress up in blazer gear to get a wide following. It just goes to show you it's not a question of image these days. It's more a question of the actual music. So I don't mean to be insulting the public's intelligence by saying the reason I'm playing "Fanfare for the Common Man" is because I want them to listen to the original. That may have been the case six years ago, but since then it's become part of what people expect of me. I still occasionally enjoy other people's music. If a piece comes out which lends itself to a particular situation, a particular meter, then I use it. If it doesn't, I don't force the issue. My music has been tagged with the label "classical rock," which I guess is okay. Broadly speaking, I guess that's true, but it's not a term that I want to really like.

      What would you call it?
      It guess it is classical rock. [laughs], mainly because I can't think of anything else to call it. It's playing classical music with a definite meter behind it. That sounds nicer. It's like calling a guy who collects rubbish a waste disposal officer instead of a dustman. It sounds far more polite. Like, how would you term what you call music? I call it playing classical music with the focus on the meter, a straight, rigid meter -- one that's different from what the composer originally intended. Or, rudely speaking, dustman -- classical rock.

      What made you want to write a piano concerto?
      I said, "Look, I'm gonna write a piano concerto. That's my biggest wish." And I went to John Mayer for technical advice. He said, "Fine. What form would you like it to be in?" And I said, "Sonata form." And we went from there. He'd tell me what I need here and there and this is what has to come next to make it work. It's all instinctive with me. Often there were times he'd say, "Well, look. It's stuck. We have to... You have to make a movement there that's fast." And I'd invariably come up with something on the spot. We always worked together, either at my house or at his. Then I'd be listening to it and it just seemed to work. And he'd say, "Well, or course it works, because..." And then he'd reel off the formula for why it worked.

      Can you play just about anything you can hear?
      No. I mean the "Fugue" on the Trilogy album was literally written out on paper before I ever played it. I couldn't work out a fugue any other way. Some people are very clever and can improvise them. It's great to be able to do that. But as for me, I have to write it down, look at it, and work it out. I don't write things that are easy for me. Everything that I write is a new step forward. Sometimes I hear it in the back of my mind and know the effect that I want, but I can't get it. I work at it for days and days and days.

      Do you write out all of the music for the band to learn?
      Now I do in order to get the orchestrations down, but the earlier stuff like Tarkus wasn't written out. I'm very aware of what Carl and Greg do, and in the case of Tarkus Carl was very struck by different time signatures. He told me that he'd like to do something in 5/4, so I said I'd keep that in mind and started writing Tarkus from there. Greg wasn't too sure about it at the beginning. It was too weird. But he agreed to try it, and afterwards he loved it. Listening back to those things, I think they just scratch the surface. It moves too quickly from one idea to the other. One thing I manage to do now is expand more on an idea. I get more out of it than doing just little bits and pieces. I think if I did Tarkus again today, I'd orchestrate it and it would should marvelous.

      Using a full orchestra?
      Yes.

      Do you think you used your keyboard setup like an orchestra before?
      Yeah. Listening back to past records, I don't think I really listened to them as they are. I've always thought they were something far bigger. And I found that every time I listened back I'd say, "Well, it could've been this way." So I figured, why not go ahead and do it? So I made the decision to go ahead and start using the orchestra. I had had an amount of experience with the Nice and the Royal Philharmonic. In fact, the Nice were one of the first bands to work with an orchestra live. John Lord with Deep Purple did it too. He had a bigger success that I did with his concerto, but I think his came after my Five Bridges Suite. I don't know how well Five Bridges did, but I liked the record. I found it quite a lot of fun working with orchestras then, and I thought I'd like to do it again.

      In the past you've voiced contempt towards the musicians found in orchestras
      Yeah, but I think I've altered my feelings since then. I used to talk to John Mayer a lot about this. He used to tell me, "You've got it all wrong. Orchestras are not against you." I wasn't too sure. When I brought my piano concerto in to be recorded I was still very dubious. I got the usual larking about. People would go to the back where the conductor couldn't see them and get the porny magazines out [laughs]. And you know, I'd already gotten to record the "Bolero" with an orchestra and I had realized how hard it was to play. You see, these trumpet players had all been used to Mozart and Beethoven. They only have to play in certain registers for that. And all of a sudden they had to scream out these high notes and they couldn't cut it. Their lips weren't up for that. I gave them all the chances in the world. This was the London Philharmonic. I took a ten-minute break that I didn't owe to them just so they could practice their part. In fact, it was the orchestra leader's decision that it might be a good idea. But they didn't practice one bit. They didn't even bother. They just sat there and smoked and talked. The orchestra leader was disgusted. I'm fairly sold on the idea that we had about the best orchestra in the world touring with us. It's certainly got the best trumpet section I've ever heard. They're unreal. They do such impossible things. You'd think they were synthesizers. Everybody in the orchestra is so friendly. No one is uptight at all. Absolutely no complaints. When we had to halt the whole thing for a period of time it was very hard. Very upsetting. There were a lot of things that were unforeseen that made us have to stop using the orchestra. There were many things, more than I can go into. One was a rule by the union that musicians can't travel more than about 100 miles to the next place and we'd only have half the house filled. Of course, we were planning on having every place completely sold out so we could at least break even. And a lot of little things started piling up to put us behind. From then on it was impossible to catch up on the finances, so we just had to stop and go out as a three-piece.

      Have you had to bring the L-100 back into the act?
      Yeah. We also thought we were going to drop Tarkus, but we're doing a somewhat abbreviated version of that, too. We really didn't expect to drop the orchestra at all. So obviously we had rehearsed what we'd be playing with the orchestra. When we stopped using the orchestra we were faced with me working overtime to compensate for what the orchestra used to do. I've really got my hands full. And even so, there were a few numbers we couldn't do without them -- "The Enemy God" and so on. There are so many orchestral lines in that that it's impossible for one person to play it. And with ELP alone it's only possible to play the first movement of my concerto. Then I have to play some of the orchestra's lines. Luckily, people have come expecting the orchestra and still haven't been too disappointed. In fact, a lot of people said we sounded better without them. I'm inclined to disagree with that. They do get more of a chance to see ELP together as a threesome, though. I think that some of them are under the impression that the orchestra is taking a lot of what we are meant to be doing away from us. It's really untrue. Actually, what the orchestra is enabling us to do is more of the ELP repertoire that we've ever done before. Like the "Bolero" from Trilogy. We tried doing that as a trio in all manner of ways. I even taught Greg to play keyboards for it.

      Didn't you have him playing Mellotron and Minimoog?
      That's right. Then we had the strings on a tape recorder and Carl had headphones on. He played drums to that. It didn't work for too long. The tape broke down one night and everything fell to pieces. So we never used that again. I think the only number that suffers without the orchestra is "Pirates." It sounds too thin for my ears, but the audience still goes along.

      How much influence did Copland have on the orchestration of "Pirates"?
      Well, I've always loved Copland. I don;t know if there was an conscious influence. There is one part that's vaguely Coplandish, but I think in general it's all pretty integrated with all my musical influences. It's really hard to point out. I guess you might say there's more Stravinsky than Copland there. That was intentional, with those pounding accents coming in.. It wasn't exactly the same as The Rite of Spring, but I had that in mind.

      How did you become fluent in playing so many different styles of music?
      You get that way. You pick up different styles. I think my father was the chief influence there. He used to play in a dance band. He didn't read music, and his main wish when I started getting in touch with the piano was that I be versatile. Versatility was his key word. They really had me taught some safeguards so that I'd always be able to make money someplace. Like as a sideline. That's as far as they wanted it to go. Versatility and being able to read were the two most important things as far as they were concerned. My background from my father's side was pretty musical, and his sister ran a dancing school. Ballet, jazz, everything. I started making money when I realized that versatility wasn't a game. It was an important thing. Because one second I'd be asked to play organ for a bingo session, during the intermission, and the next minute I'd be out playing a dinner and dance date or a club or a jazz date. I used to do all sorts of things. All of this sort of went along with being taught privately. I had a little old lady about 80 years old. If fact I had about three teachers altogether. They were all local. They taught as a sideline.

      How much did classical music have to do with the development of your jazz style?
      When I was about 14 I wanted to buy some books what would give me some insight on jazz piano. A piano player I knew told me he developed his style from playing Debussy. I tried it but really couldn't find anything of any value there that would influence a jazz style for me. I think what it came do to was playing a lot with a jazz orchestra. That exposed me to a lot of jazz improvisation. And you could buy arrangements sometimes for small combos or solo piano which had improvised solos in them. People like Brubeck and George Shearing very helpfully published books that had improvisations written out. I found that quite helpful. Until I bought those books, I was playing pseudo-jazz piano in the right hand and stride in the left.

      Did you pick up things off records?
      I didn't have a record player, so I used to get it from the radio. I also used to go up to London to hear jazz. So my exposure to jazz was what was being played on the radio. When you do that, you have to wait and wonder, "Well, who was that?" And you might find out within a week. I remember one tune that was being played quite a lot. Floyd Cramer's "On the Rebound" [RCA, 447-0704]. That was a major influence on me throughout. And then there were various jazz players. [Musician/comedian] Dudley Moore was one of them. He had a TV show. At the time, I was playing stride piano because I'd bought some Art Tatum and Fats Waller sheet music. And suddenly I heard Dudley Moore. He played this style that sounded great. I couldn't figure out how he was doing it. When I tried to imitate him it came out like Fats Waller in the left hand and Dudley Moore in the right. That's when I realized what the advantages of having a bass player were. Before that I used to do concerts with just drums and piano, because I thought that bass players -- well, you never really hear them anyway [laughs]. They only got in the way of my left hand.

      When you'd use the organ, did you fill in the bass on the pedals?
      Yeah, but I never became proficient at it like doing a walking bass. I can use the pedals for straight filler stuff, but nothing like Jimmy McGriff or Jimmy Smith, who I think uses a combination of the left hand and feet, can do.

      When did you add the Moog to your setup? Did you consider it an extension of the organ?
      It was. I those days I didn't really know what I was looking for. It was all trial and error. A lot of the sounds I was getting from the L-100 were completely accidental. With the Moog, I went into a record shop where they knew me. Walter Carlos's Switched-On Bach [Columbia, MS-7194] had just been released. They played it for me in the shop. I didn't honestly like it. The guy played it for me because it had the Brandenburg thing in G, which I had done with the Nice [on Ars Longa Vita Brevis]. The guy asked me if I'd heard this version, played it for me, and asked me what I thought of it. I said it sounded horrible. It was too boggy, too laid down. But there was a picture of the thing it was played on, and I said, "So what's this?" And he said it was like a telephone switchboard. And I said, "Oh, that's interesting." So I bought the album. I got word through my office that a guy by the name of Mike Vickers had had a Moog shipped over to England, so I asked if I could have a look at it. We got together, and he set it up in his room. He explained to me the functioning of the instrument. I said, "Well, can it be used on stage?" And he said, "No way. you don't realize the complications in this. There's no way you could do that." I thought there must be some way, and asked, "What if you hid down behind this thing and programmed it while I was playing it? You know, set up all these things and keep it in tune?" I was playing at the Festival Hall with the Royal Philharmonic and the Nice. I thought I'd use the synthesizer as an added touch. So Mike Vickers was hunched down backstage, but he'd pop up ever now and then and put a plug in somewhere. It worked excellently. So I immediately sent off to Moog and got some literature back. At the time Bob was developing his preset thing, so I said, "I want one."

      What happened when you got it?
      It arrived in a box, no instructions or anything. It was all in bits and pieces. I couldn't even get a sound out of it. I was at the point of throwing the damn thing out the window. I frantically rang up Mike Vickers and asked him, "How do I get some sound here?" He said, "Oh. You got it! I'd love to see it!" So he came around, and he couldn't figure it out either. He knew how to operate the unit, but it had taken him ages because he hadn't gotten any instructions either. He couldn't work out the presets. But he kept at it for about three days and rang me up and said, "I think I've got it." He came over with diagrams to show which switches were the envelope generators, and which were the voltage-controlled amplifiers, and which were the voltage-controlled filters, and which were the mixers, and so on. He worked out a number of presets that were usable. I've been using that unit with the band ever since. But then there's the age-old problem of synthesizers going out of tune. That was very annoying. We finally got around to getting a frequency counter.

      So you took it out on stage right from the start?
      Yeah. That was the first time it was ever used on stage. Well, I think they had a thing called the Moog Quartet or something that used it live, but that didn't last long. Nobody had ever toured with a big Moog before.

      Do you find yourself using synthesizer mainly for effects?
      Yeah. I think my use of synthesizer is basically all effects. It's just been a case of trying to get new sounds that you wouldn't hear on any other instrument. It's got to have a definite characteristic that's obviously a synthesizer. I think it's excellent what other people have done with, say, the Minimoog, where sometimes you can't tell whether it's a Minimoog or a guitar. They've found clever uses for the pitch and modulation controls. But I've never used the synthesizer to copy. There's no real point in it if you can't tell if that's a guitar playing or a Moog. With me, you say, "That is definitely a Moog." Otherwise you can get confused. It gets mixed in with the organ sound.

      What about on "Abaddon's Bolero" from Trilogy? Isn't that contrary to what you're saying?
      Yeah. That was an attempt to copy the Walter Carlos thing. That was one occasion where I tried to copy trumpet sounds and the like.

      How did you get the string sound at the beginning of "Trilogy"?
      That was a Minimoog. I used one oscillator for the audio and the third oscillator for modulation. But I don't know. I'm not that keen on it anymore.

      You sound like you want to stop using the synthesizer.
      I think I want to, yeah. It's such a lot of work. And a lot of worry, you know? Something can always go wrong, at least it does for me anyway. Even with having the best people working for us, like Nick and Chris, there's still a great element of risk. Dampness and everything effects its tuning, and I can't devote my head fully to the music. There's always that worry that it's not going to work when I reach for it in the next passage. It is going to be in tune or isn't it? If it's out of tune, there's nothing I can do about it, because I'm too busy with my other hand. So you have to make snap decisions all the time. I don't think one should be forced into a position like that in playing. To play properly, you need to have a clear, open head.

      What would you replace the synthesizer with?
      I thing I would go back to the organ the the piano.

      Would you still keep the Yamaha GX-1 around?
      I think I might be tempted to. I do like that instrument. Yet the problems are great. Without Nick's device it would go out of tune. And when I hear that people like Stevie Wonder used it and backed off from using it live, it makes me realize that it's a bit of a gamble. Nevertheless, I'm committed, because I've recorded with it, and things wouldn't sound right on anything else. I've tried playing "Fanfare" on the organ and it really sounds horrible. It doesn't sound good on the piano, either, yet it sounds all right with the Yamaha.

      How did you develop your knowledge of what the synthesizer can do?
      Just by working with it. Mind you, the patching arrangement I've got now on that big system is stupid. Everything interlocks and there are so many things going into multiples and feeding into different places it's like a jigsaw puzzle. If something goes wrong with it then it usually fits into about ten different categories. Finding that it's not in one of those means I have to search back from the leads.

      While you're playing?
      I can't do that. It would take too long. It's totally impossible.

      So what do you do when something goes wrong onstage?
      Pray [laughs]. Well, if it's gone totally crazy I just switch it off. Sometimes it's been playing on its own, so I've had to find some way of shutting it up completely. I have to yell to the roadie to switch the damn thing off. It did that at the California Jam. The humidity drove it crazy. Everything one it -- fans and all -- couldn't keep the humidity from settling on it. The guy looking over it was checking on it as if it were a baby. It was fine. He was listening with headphones. I kept asking if it was still okay. He's say, "Yeah, just fine." Then five minutes before the show I listened to it and it was stuck -- playing on its own. So I said, "We can't take it out like that." Then it stopped and we took it out. When I started playing it, and the first synthesizer lines in Tarkus, it wouldn't stop with the last note I'd hit. It was as if the VCA was wide open, but it wasn't. So then I thought it might be the ribbon, and I disconnected that. But it didn't stop. You'd play a line and it would go nnnnnnn at the end. In order to play it I'd have to switch the audio off and then on when I needed it again.

      How is the opening synthesizer part to "Hoedown," from Trilogy, done?
      The actual rise time is from the envelope generator. It's attenuated. The actual harmony is controlled by the sustain on the envelope generator. That can also be varied by the attenuator. That also alters the pace. The rest is conventional: oscillators into the filter, controlled by the envelopes, into the VCA, and out to the trunk lines. I came up with that just by messing around. All of a sudden this wailing noise came out, and I thought, "Oh I've got to use that in something. It sounds very nice. Sounds like a hoedown. A pretty far-out sort of hoedown."

      Where does the accordion come in?
      [Laughs] Well, me dad had one. He wasn't playing it much so I decided to have a go at it. I've played a lot of weird things in my time. You may have noticed something called a Zoukra on Trilogy. It's a double reed instrument. It's very hard to play. I used it on the beginning of "The Endless Enigma." It sounds like bagpipes. I almost blew my brains out trying to get that note. It was mad. I came back from Tunisia having bought it from an Arab.

      How do you feel about the prototype Polymoog that you have?
      Well, I don't really like it that much. I don't use it anymore. You know, I helped design that. I spent about a week with Dave Luce in the studio. While I was there I was saying, "It's good, but it could be better if you did this and this, and added this to it." So he made some notes and then went back to Buffalo and had the second prototype made up. When I went to Buffalo, I tried it again. All the bumps were out and I said, "Well, it could be good if you had the knobs in this position." So he made some more notes, followed those ideas through, and the next thing I'm expecting is to see the end result. You'd think that after working on the instrument I'd get to see it. But the next thing I know, they've sent it to Switzerland. I won't say to whom. Well, I was a bit upset. After all, after using it on record, helping develop the ideas for the one that was put out on the market, I felt I was involved and it was a bit of a shock when it went off in some different direction. So for a little bit of time I more or less said, "Screw you," to it. But Moog Music must have had some reason for it, and I don't feel particularly bitter for it now. We still have a very good relationship, an excellent relationship really. They are always on hand when I need them, and I like that. It just struck me as rather odd. In fact the whole band thought it was a bit under the arm. One thing: I have to buy everything. Carl gets his drums free. Whenever he wants a drum all he has to do is ask for it and he gets it. I have to buy everything. Hammond doesn't give you anything. Oh, I think we have an arrangement with Leslie. The only thing I've gotten free from any of these companies is a guitar, which is valued at about $90.00. Greg gets guitars and strings, and Carl gets drumsticks, skins -- drum kits galore. He could get a drum kit every week if he wanted to, I'm sure. Well, I may sound bitter. Yes, I've had a hard time, it hasn't been easy. Still, I'm not worried. The show must go on [laughs].

      What type of action do you prefer in a piano?
      It took me a long time to choose the one I have in my home. We had rather a load of them to look through. I think it's one in a million. Greg also bought one. His doesn't compare with mine at all. It has a great crashing sound -- unbelievable. It'll probably get better, too. So I don't like new pianos. Quite honestly, I like the Bosendorfer action, but I don't thing they are so easy to get a hold of. I had a decision to make when I bought my piano for my home -- whether it was going to be a Bosendorfer or a Steinway. The action was too light on the Bosendorfer so I went with the Steinway. I think Yamaha is topping the Steinway now, though.

      What do you think of the Yamaha electric grand?
      I think it's great. I saw George Duke play it in Montreal and all of a sudden it seemed alive. The sound just sprang out. I couldn't see what he was using from where I was sitting. I thought he had got hold of of some new supersonic pickup and put it on the piano. It was great. I've just gotten hold of one myself. I play "Nut Rocker" on it. It has the most amazing sound. It doesn't replace the Steinway, but in a few years' time I think it could. It doesn't have the full grand piano range. It goes out of tune pretty rapidly, too. I use the Yamaha though a Harmonizer to give it that honky-tonk effect, so fortunately it doesn't need to be accurately in tune.

      Speaking of honky-tonk effects, how did you get that sound on "Benny the Bouncer," from Brain Salad Surgery? And was that the same way you got it on "The Sheriff," from Trilogy?
      Let's see, how was that done? One of them was done by putting one of the strings out of tune. Detuning it so that it had the right number of beats to get the effect I wanted. The other was done with one piano being straight and another piano being overdubbed that was put through a flanger. I played the same line on both pianos, but one of them was slightly out of tune because of the flanger.

      How far in advance do you know you're going to do something like that in the studio?
      We usually rehearse quite extensively for about three weeks before we go in to record, and by the time we get in the studio we've got a fair idea of what we're going to do. I won't make many changes, but what can happen is that when I've heard the tape played back a few times, there'll be something in my head that goes on and says to me, "This line should really be in there. I can improve on that. This is how it should sound." And I'll overdub that line. Occasionally I've gotten carried away and put down overdubs that are just impossible to do when I play it live. But I don't get in the habit of doing too many overdubs. Sometimes they're done just to enhance a particular sound, like with the organ being double-tracked on "Jerusalem."

      Was the solo at the end of "Lucky Man," from you first album, added as an afterthought?
      As is usual on Greg's acoustic pieces, Greg goes into the studio while the rest of us aren't around. I just happened to be in the studio at the same time Greg was doing "Lucky Man." And Greg said, "Why don't you do something on the end?" So I improvised something. I didn't think much of the solo. Honestly, it's a lot of shit. But it was just what he wanted. I just did a rough setting on the synthesizer, went in, and played something off the top of my head.

      How do you structure an improvised solo, like for example on the live recording of "Rondo," from Everything as Nice as Mother Makes It?
      Well, I fall into a framework, but if I'm feeling particularly adventurous in a gig and the acoustics are good, and everything is in my favor, I sort of break away from any structure I've clung to in the past. A lot of things really depend on it. The lower you start and the more relaxed the approach is at the beginning, the more ground you've got to build on to get to a heavy climax. If you start on a heavy approach then you've got to work your ass off to climax enough to make it a sensible solo. Sometimes I have what I call landmarks in the structure which I head for. These landmarks help to keep the audience in touch, because you might be getting too far off the subject. It gives some method of association. These landmarks can be various things. One thing that I like to do are quotes. I'm not sure, but I think that "Rondo" had some quotes in it. You know, in general, I'd say the Nice were more improvisational than ELP.

      Did you play the keyboards on Greg Lake's and Carl Palmer's sides of Works, Vol. 1?
      I'm on one of Greg's tracks, "Nobody Loves You Live I Do." I did a lot of ragtime piano in the middle, but it's mixed so far down that you can't hear it. It's really not worth mentioning. I was more involved on Carl's side, in transcribing "Tank" along with Harry South. I put all the Moog and various other keyboards in there. I was also involved in the composition of "L.A. Nights," on which, again, I think the actual theme was too heavily mixed down. But that's Carl's side. It's his prerogative.

      So you didn't play accordion solo on "C'est La Vie"?
      No. I felt quite bewildered about that, because when Greg came into my house playing "C'est La Vie," I got my accordion out and suggested that when he recorded it, it might be a good idea to put an accordion solo on it. I think it was at a time when we were being secretive about our solo projects. It was almost taboo for one of us to be in the studio when another of us was doing something for a solo album. I think that's why Greg brought in another accordion player. Anyway, onstage I copy that solo. I don't even know who the accordion player was on that album.

      Do you have any advice for kids who are getting started in music?
      Well, get a good grounding from a good teacher. I think that's most important. The teacher has to be one who doesn't stunt your growth. The teacher has to give fresh ideas. There are so many different techniques, it's hard to choose the right one. I recently had a teacher who tried to get me to play in a relaxed fashion, but I'll never be a relaxed player. In England there's a school of teaching that came from a guy called James Shean. He's keen on technique, and his method makes a lot of sense to me. Try as many teachers as you can, and just collect information from as many teachers as possible. Don't stay with one all the time. Do this until you're satisfied that that is the way you want to play. People are all individuals and they're all going to end up playing in different ways, so it's a question of matching up a jigsaw puzzle. Finding a teacher that suits you can save a lot of time.

Return to TOP

      The following is a discussion with Chris Young about the more technical aspects of Emerson's keyboards, which include a Yamaha GX-1 synthesizer, a custom-build Moog modular synthesizer, a two Minimoog synthesizers, a Hammond C-3, a Hammond L-100, a Steinway grand piano, a Yamaha CP70 electric grand, a harpsichord, and a Hohner accordion.

      Do you know anything about how the keyboards were set up prior to the Works, Vol. 1 tour?
      I don't know how they were with the Nice, but the ELP setup was basically very standard. The organs were run into amps and Leslies. Everything was slaved together. There were no tricks. Just a couple of beefed-up Leslies.

      What was involved in the beefing up?
      Basic stuff. A 15" JBL and a driver were substituted for the standard Leslie speakers. One was offstage, miked up of PA use. It's pretty much the same stuff people beef Leslies up with today. They were driven by Hi-Watt amplifiers.

      How did that work?
      Bill Haugh had made a generator box -- sort of a slave box -- that everything fed into. It came out of a six-conductor cable. One section of the Hi-Watts was basically for feedback for the L-100. A Hi-Watt was powering a 4x12 cabinet. The trouble with that setup was that it was messy. You had amps all over the place and it was unnecessary. At least, it's unnecessary today.

      Was the Moog fed into the Hi-Watts also?
      It went into its own bass bin and an Altec horn, which sounded good, but it was too loud. The way we're doing things now stops a lot of sound coming off stage. Before, the sound from ELP onstage wsa deafening out at the PA mix board, without the PA even being turned on. Consequently, you had mikes picking up they shouldn't have been picking up. It just made for a lot of noise. Nothing was directional, whereas now we have monitors that direct things at the player and up into the air. The audience doesn't get what's coming off of the stage. They get what's coming out of the PA.

      What type of cabinets are being used as monitors?
      They are exactly the same as the ones we are using for the PA. They were designed by Claire Brothers [Box 569, Lititz, PA 17543], and are S4s. Keith has two of them, one in front and one behind him. Each cabinet has two JBL 2405 tweeters on top, two JBL 2440s under those, four 10" K110 JBLs under those, and two 18" K151 JBLs on the bottom. They're crossed over in such a way that the two 2405s take everything over 1200Hz, the 2440s take frequencies around 1200Hz -- the crossover between the 2405s and the 2440s is mechanical -- the K110s get frequencies between 1200 and 250Hz, and the K151s get everything below 240Hz. Those are powered by S.A.E. 2600s, four of them. There are DBX 160 compressor/limiters being used as limiters mainly to keep the system from being overloaded, and JBL crossovers. Everything is set to the standard settings. We don't need to change them.

      There have been some things done to the C-3. Can you run them down for us?
      There have been some things added, but nothing has been done to change the actual sound sources. The percussion has been beefed up by substituting a resistor value. We've added a few balancing transformers. The output is now at 600 ohms. The rest is standard.

      What is the pot on the upper left-hand side of the organ for? That's not standard.
      Oh, that's a Fisher Space Expander reverb. It doesn't work. I'd be very grateful if you knew where to get one. I believe the company went out of business about four years ago. They're still the best reverb units I've come across.

      There are also some switches by the lower manual's presets. What are they for?
      They don't work either. They were Leslie speed controls for the original setup. One was for complete stop, one was for the fast speed, and one was for the slow speed. The toggle switch was just an earth drop [a grounding switch]. I don't know why it was done. It seems like a silly thing to me. The pot on the other side by the percussion controls is for the percussion beef.

      What's the red footswitch on the floor?
      That's just another switch for changing the Leslie speed. The way we amplify the organ now is by miking a stick 122 Leslie in a soundproof room. Apart from all that, the C-3 is stick. It has a few things that were done before my time that don't work. The volume pedal had a scanner put in that never worked, and there is a touch-sensitive electronic switch for the Leslie speeds made by Trek II [2229 Morris Ave., Union, NJ 07083] that never worked either. The L-100 is standard too, but that was really a maintenance problem. It has had a lot of structural work done to it.

      Is the L-100 fed through a fuzz box?
      There is a fuzz box that's used solely for feedback. It's only turned on when he wants to organ to feed back. We have a Marshall amp and a 4x12 cabinet onstage so he can get the L-100 to feed back through it; that amp is miked through the PA, too.

      What have you done to the Yamaha GX-1?
      Aside from the physical changes, painting it, and so on, we have been balancing its output. We don't use their output lines, we've added our own. We have build an extra oscillator which is inside a box under the stage. And we added Nick's tuning system. The main outputs gave out a lot of noise, though. That's why we bypassed their outputs. The tuning was also a great problem because in Switzerland, while recording, we were losing as much as a half a day just tuning the instrument, it drifted so much. We haven't turned the auto-tune system on yet, though, during the tour. For some reason the unit has held up on tour, and we've been afraid to introduce a foreign device into the system as long as we're not having any problems.

      Does everything go into the submixer that you work under the stage?
      Yes, except for the piano, the Yamaha CP70 electric grand, which goes into a Harmonizer first. They feed directly and go out stereo, either to the front monitor or to the rear monitor. It's a Trident mixer [112/114 Wardour St., London, England W1V 3AW]. It has 12 channels. The first has the Yamaha GX-1's lower manual fed to it. That goes to Keith's rear monitor. Channel two has the GX-1's upper manual, and the feeds to the front monitor. Channel three has the Yamaha's solo manual, and it feeds to both the front and rear monitor speakers. The fourth channel has the Hammond's C-3 direct signal going to both speaker cabinets. The fifth channel has the Leslie's lower left mike and feeds to the rear speakers. The six has the Leslie's upper left mike and feeds to the rear speakers. The seventh channel gets the main Moog's first channel, and it's panned more to the rear speakers but is still going to both monitors. The eighth channel has the main Moog's other channel, and it's panned more to the front monitor but is still coming out of both. Channel nine has the Minimoog that's closest to the audience. That comes out of both monitors, but is only used on "Karn Evil 9, 2nd Impression" and "Tarkus". Then I switch that channel over to the harpsichord, which is used on "Still You Turn Me On." The harpsichord is miked by a FRAP pickup, and I have to change the EQ when I switch the Minimoog with the harpsichord. Channel ten gets the Leslie's lower right mike, and that gets fed to the front monitor. The eleventh channel gets the Leslie's upper right speaker, and that feeds to the front monitor. The twelfth channel has the Minimoog farthest away from the audience. That's only used for "Tank." The instant Keith is done with "Tank," I switch that channel over to the Yamaha electric grand and change the EQ.

      Were there any modifications done to the Moog?
      There were the ones for stage effects [Ed. Note: for details see page 28.], and the other was done to the keyboard for humidity control. We were having a lot of trouble with humidity, causing the synthesizer to go out of tune and things. You know, we don't get much of a chance to go out and look at what's being done these days in terms of equipment. We like in our own little world here and there isn't time to check out who's changing what, so I only know that things were modified for us. They might be standard on the units that are coming out now. Some people keep in touch with us and let us know what they're coming out with. But like with Yamaha, we didn't know the CP70 electric grand existed until we went to see George Duke in concert. And even then, we had to go back the next day to find out what it was. When he told us it was a Yamaha, we couldn't believe they hadn't told us about it, after we spent so much money on the GX-1.

      What about modifications done to the Minimoogs?
      Here's a circuit that's been added to them. It's just heat compensation. We also cut the keyboards out from the bodies.

      Are the organs set up to run on both 100 and 200 volts?
      We have two organs that run on 110, and two that run on 240 volts. The latter are used as spares in case something goes wrong. We have a transformer in case we have to use one of the 240-volt organs in an emergency. We have a spare of everything, in fact, except the GX-1. There are two Minimoogs, spare modules for the big system, a spare keyboard, everything.

      Is the accordion you're using left over from Keith's younger days?
      No. I picked it up in Montreal. I had to choose between getting a flashy chrome one and one that looked a bit aged. I went for the one that looked a bit aged. It seemed more logical for the tune it was used in -- "C'est La Vie."

      What kind of pickup is being used on the Steinway grand?
      It was a FRAP, but that didn't do the job so we went back to using a Countryman pickup and mikes. The Countryman is used mainly on the mix that goes out front to the audience. That man at the PA handles that; I don't get the piano's signal at all. The mikes are used mainly for the mix in the monitors. We're using two Sennheiser 421s on the treble end. They're stuck in the sound holes. And there's one AKG U414EB on the bass end. That's just clipped on.

      As Moog describes the synthesizer Emerson originally purchased, "The unit consisted of one modular cabinet. It was a console-type with wood sides and one preset box, a keyboard, and a ribbon controller. He's added to that system ever since." The original unit reportedly cost Emerson about $4,000. Since then, however, he's put much more into it.

      The most unique part of Keith's system is obviously the preset unit. "That sets the frequencies of three oscillators with control voltages," Moog informs CK. "It also sets the filter cutoff frequency. The envelope generators are preset by actual resistor substitution. Then there are four mixers with voltage controlled attenuators in each. There are sliders build right into the circuit cards in the back of the unit that let you set up the preset you want. There are three-position toggle switches on the front panel that allow for the switching of octaves, and the actual tuning of the oscillator is on the front panel of each mixer. That way the instrument can be fine-tuned before the concert begins. Keith has a total of 14 presets." There are 14 red buttons on the preset unit itself and another 14 in the remote box that sits on the Hammond C-3 that control which preset is actually engaged.

      Emerson also has a one-of-a-kind sample-and-hold module that even has his name silkscreened on it. This, Moog states, can be triggered or controlled by the keyboard, ribbon, or other voltage source just by throwing various switches.

      The keyboard and ribbon control that Keith uses have both been modified to act as triggers for some special effects that are unique to ELP. The last key on the keyboard is red instead of white. This key, when a switch on the left side of the keyboard is thrown, sets of an explosion accompanied by dry-ice smoke into which the four-tiered modular synthesizer disappears. The ribbon, which has actually blown up in Keith's hands twice, has recently been rebuilt so that ti can, in Emerson's words, "Probably fire a 45-calibre shell and not blow up again." The reason it blew up? Keith has had an attachment built into it that launches flash paper and other pyrotechnic items over the heads of the audience. One accident with the ribbon took his fingernail off. The latest knocked him over backwards and completely demolished the ribbon controller. There is also a switch on the ribbon that triggers one of his sequencers, which is patched to sound like a machine gun.

      Emerson was also influential in the design of the Polymoog synthesizer. He played the first prototype on "Benny the Bouncer" on the Brain Salad Surgery album, and toured with two-thirds of the entire unit, which was originally called the Constellation. It consisted of the Apollo, the early version of the Polymoog; the Lyra, a monophonic instrument that never saw the light of mass production; and the Taurus bass pedal synthesizer. The latter was the third of the unit that Keith didn't use.

      The first Polymoog, the Apollo was an instrument that created only percussive sounds. It didn't have the ability to sustain tones. According to Dave Luce, the designer of the instrument, it was both direct comments and observations made by Rich Walborn, a Moog technician who traveled with ELP for a year, that made it obvious to Moog Music that certain changes needed to be made in the unit. "The Apollo was a one-oscillator instrument," explains Luce. "It became clear that it needed to have two oscillators, a thicker sound, to cut through. Another thing that Keith suggested, he being a piano player originally, was that the keyboard have more than 48 notes. If what you want is a one-note effects machine, 48 keys is enough. But if you want to sit down and play the instrument unaccompanied, you need to have a larger keyboard."