|
Poe Artists: Eric Woolfson
An interview with Eric Woolfson, the prolific composer of Poe concept albums...and also a Poe musical that will debut in Berlin, Germany on March 27th, 2009. Backgrounder: Born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1945, Eric had an uncle in Glasgow who played the piano masterfully and who inspired Eric to want to become a musician. After a very short spell of piano lessons which were soon abandoned, Eric started playing by himself and became a self-taught pianist who still cannot read music! In his teens, Eric went to London and managed to get work as a session pianist and worked with musicians such as Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones who went on to form LED ZEPPELIN and managed to fix a meeting with the Record Producer & Co. Manager of THE ROLLING STONES, Andrew Loog Oldham. A budding composer, Eric signed other publishing deals with other companies as his repertoire flourished and more and more of his songs found their way to major recording artists, both in Europe and America. He signed a deal with Southern Music where he joined the ranks of composers such as Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Eric remembers Lloyd Webber and Rice's decision to create stage musicals as a vehicle for their songs, rather than the more difficult route of trying for covers by the big artists of the day. As time went by, Eric realized how well founded their idea was. Meanwhile, Eric had the idea to make an album inspired by Edgar Allan Poe. Eric produced the recordings but was not sure that he had the necessary skill to realize such a grandiose project and shelved the idea. Despite having many of his songs recorded all over Europe, Eric found that earning a living as a songwriter was not easy and so he decided to try his hand at artist management. His first two clients were a singer CARL DOUGLAS who had just reached the top of the charts with KUNG FU FIGHTING and a record producer called ALAN PARSONS who he had met while on a session at Abbey Road Studios. Now having access to Alan's production and engineering talent, Eric saw an opportunity to mirror this in the record business by combining his own writing talents with Alan's. His Edgar Allan Poe idea came off the shelf and the ALAN PARSONS PROJECT was born. The first album entitled TALES OF MYSTERY AND IMAGINATION, EDGAR ALLAN POE was released in 1976. It was immediately obvious that there was more to the idea than one album, but as the original record deal was for only the first album, a new deal was done with Arista Records for nine further albums. Despite there being no live performances and few obvious hit singles the venture was a great success. There were however hit singles (many on which Eric sang lead vocal) including EYE IN THE SKY, TIME and DON'T ANSWER ME, three of which in addition to record sales, have been played on American radio more than 1 million times. Eric's work POE re-visits his original inspiration Edgar Allan Poe. It had its world premiere showcase at Abbey Road Studios in 2003 and there is an album available containing about half of the material from the musical entitled 'POE, More Tales of Mystery and Imagination'. In 2007 Eric's musical DANCING SHADOWS premieres in Asia. This is a unique musical project inspired by a famous Korean play entitled A FOREST FIRE. The noted playwright and author Ariel Dorfman has written the book and Eric has written the music and lyrics. EAP200: What inspired you to write the first Poe songs that you did in collaboration with Alan Parson on Tales of Mystery and Imagination? Were you always a fan of Poe's works? Woolfson: The story goes back to when I was about 10 years old in Glasgow and on my way to school, I passed a cinema which regularly showed Edgar Allan Poe movies. They had a large picture window into which they put displays and I vividly remember their representation of the Pit and the Pendulum. Being so young, I was not allowed to see these films. I recall that normally, for an adult movie they had an 'X' certificate, but for these POE movies they created an 'H' for 'Horrific' category which was really just a marketing ploy, but it created a fascination with what I might have been allowed to see had I been older. Some years later, I decided to take evening classes in marketing, which was then a new science. The lecturer in explaining marketing, said that as there was no agreed definition at that stage, he could only give an example. The example he gave was a marketing statistic which was that no film of Edgar Allan Poe's work had ever lost money. This instilled in me, at a time when I was developing as a song writer, the idea that if no film of Poe's film had lost money, then perhaps an album might be a good idea too. My Poe inspired compositions began to develop when I had read some of his works. Some further years later, I went into the studio with some friends from the group The Tremeloes and we recorded a few of my ideas which are now included as bonus tracks on the recently released Deluxe edition of Tales of Mystery and Imagination. At this stage I had not even met Alan Parsons, but when our paths crossed, he asked me to be his manager as a record producer/ engineer. He had enjoyed great acclaim with Pink Floyd's 'Dark Side of the Moon' and had been an assistant engineer with the 'Beatles'. We enjoyed many successful productions (including Pilot, Cockney Rebel, Year of the Cat etc) and Alan once said to me 'if only I didn't have to take the artist's views into account, I could make much better records'. This prompted a thought that there was an opportunity here to make records the way Stanley Kubrick or Hitchcock made movies where the people behind the camera were the important factor, or in this case, the person behind the control desk. I also realised that there was an opportunity to combine my earlier enthusiasm for Poe and put together a proposition which I called 'The Alan Parsons Project'. The record company immediately bought this and assumed this title was the name of a group and the whole successful series of albums was born, but the first was 'Tales of Mystery and Imagination, Edgar Allan Poe' Alan made only a minimal contribution as a writer to some of the music on Tales of Mystery, but I allowed him to be credited whether he had contributed or not. His main contribution of course was in the excellence of the engineering and production values of the recordings.
Woolfson: When the deal was done with the record company, it was unusually a one off album contract, as normally an artist would be signed for several albums. Surprisingly, despite initial success of Tales of Mystery, the record company were not interested in more product. I had always had in mind a Volume II and possibly III of Tales of Mystery and Imagination and when we signed with another record company for future product, I mentioned this, but as they did not own the rights to the original record, they were unenthusiastic about a Volume II. So I had to shelve the idea until much later when we had competed our 9 album commitment to the new company. Nearly 30 years had passed and Alan and I had, by this stage, moved in different directions. I had gone in the direction of musical theatre which had little appeal to him. So I made 'POE, More Tales of Mystery and Imagination' as a taster of my POE musical. I'm pleased to say that the POE musical will premiere next year in Berlin, Germany, prior to a European tour. EAP200: Your music has always had a wonderful theatricality to it. Can you tell us what's happening with the Poe stage musical project? Will it still happen? Woolfson: We will have announcements and box office details in the next few weeks (Note from EAP 200: details are available on the official site) EAP200: What do you think of the upcoming bicentennial of Poe's birth on Jan 19, 2009? Woolfson: I have been eagerly anticipating this event for many years and I'm thrilled that the year of 'Eddy's' birthday will be the year of the premiere of my POE musical (March 27th, 2009, in Berlin, Germany). EAP200: Can you please tell us about any other projects you have in the works right now? Woolfson: I have just completed work on a new collection of recordings under the title 'Eric Woolfson sings The Project That Never Was'. This includes two songs from the POE musical (Immortal & Somewhere in the Audience) and the original version of a song that was adapted for the musical (Train to Wuxi). This will be available to purchase through the Official APP Website. I'm also developing the musical I wrote with the distinguished dramatist Ariel Dorfman 'Dancing Shadows' which won 5 Korean Tony awards at its premiere last year in Seoul. In conclusion, I would just like to share that whenever I am asked in interviews about what inspires me, I invariably mention great minds such as Sigmund Freud or Antonio Gaudi, the Spanish architect. However, for me, the greatest inspiration will always be Poe, because it is not only his work which is fascinating, but inspiration also comes from his extraordinary life as well. For more about Eric Woolfson's music, visit his official Website. Photos: Copyright Eric Woolfson Music - used with permission |
gg
|
