I wasn’t so much of a classical music fan at the start, more folk rock,” says guitarist and vocalist John Lees, looking back at the early days of Barclay James Harvest with Prog via a video-call from his music room.
“Woolly Wolstenholme would play tenor horn as well as keyboards, I’d play recorder and Les [Holroyd] had the cello as well as bass. It set us aside, gave us something a little bit different than other people who were setting off in that progressive music scene.”
But as the 60s moved into the 70s, the group’s classical leanings developed and their ambition quickly outgrew these tentative beginnings. Their self-titled 1970 debut album featured the grandly named Barclay James Harvest Symphony Orchestra, and they became the first rock band to tour with a full orchestra – an exercise that made their name but almost bankrupted them.
“The songs had a quality of melody that lent themselves to being orchestrated and I think that’s been an ongoing thing,” says Lees.
In September 2023, as John Lees’ Barclay James Harvest, the group played their first full orchestral concert in the UK for 50 years at Huddersfield Town Hall with the Slaithwaite Philharmonic, conducted by Benjamin Ellin. The extremely well-received show has yielded the recently released CD and DVD set, Philharmonic! The Orchestral Concert.
“It was a lovely idea, because it’s a local orchestra to us,” Lees explains. “They’re amateur musicians, but they’re retired professionals as well, so they’re no slouches.”
The idea of the concert was prompted by “pressure from friends” after the band played two sold-out nights in 2018 at the Herodeon Theatre, Athens, an amphitheatre in the shadow of the Acropolis – perhaps the ultimate prog concert setting – along with the Athens State Orchestra augmented by musicians from the Prague Philharmonic.
“The view from the stage was a floodlit Acropolis. How often do you get the chance to play there?” Lees says. “We look back at the photographs and it’s just ridiculous.”
Bass player and vocalist Craig Fletcher is with Lees in his studio. He still refers to himself as the “new boy, the apprentice”, having only been in the band since 1998 – when Lees and original bass guitarist Les Holroyd parted ways and then ran two different versions of the band. He shares his memories of the evening.
“I usually speak to the audience while John settles in,” he explains. “I said, ‘Good evening, everybody. I’m sure you know who we are. For those that don’t, we come from a small fishing village in England called Manchester. It’s very similar to this, except our weather is a lot better’, and they all went ‘Waaaggh!’ It was the most gorgeous setting with the moon just beginning to come up, a balmy 20°C evening. One of the best things I’ve ever done.”
Back in the 1970s, rock bands playing with an orchestra was a rarity and could be an uneasy alliance. Classical musicians didn’t always take this new musical hybrid seriously. During rehearsals for the 1969 première of Jon Lord’s Concerto For Group and Orchestra, where Deep Purple combined with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, one of the cellists flounced out of rehearsals, likening it to “a second-rate Beatles”. When Camel played The Snow Goose at the Royal Albert Hall in 1975 with the London Symphony Orchestra,
Andy Latimer recalled two French horn players getting bored, talking to each other and playing out of tune. On a more practical level, Rick Wakeman experienced problems in timing that can arise from a rock band who play on the beat with an orchestra that tends to play behind it, when rehearsing Journey To The Centre Of The Earth with the LSO in 1973.
Although Barclay James Harvest produced one of the most successful amalgams of rock and classical music, they initially experienced timing issues with the Barclay James Harvest Symphony Orchestra, who were music students.
“I think the musicians, and the conductors, are more attuned to it now,” says Lees. “Ben [Ellin] was directing and conducting the and there were no timing issues; it sat very well. We were watching him, but I remember in the early concerts with the Barclays, it was us and them. The conductor was for them and you didn’t take that much notice. We got away with it mostly, but in certain songs we didn’t, like Dark Now My Sky, if you listen to some of the original EMI recordings, you can hear there’s a bit of a wobble in timing.”
image [https://cdn.magzter.com/1625747790/1729078929/articles/oXtHIIZ_i1729411475074/0142880984.jpg]
“There were not so much issues, but occasional bits of uncertainty, which Ben and Kev [Whitehead] the drummer worked out,” says Fletcher. “Kevin said, ‘I’ll do a four hi-hat count there’, and Ben had that in the cans [his headphones] and the orchestra came in perfectly.”
The band also had to rearrange and edit their own parts in some of the songs for these orchestral performances. They encountered a bit of a problem during the Athens shows.
“When we did the Herodeon Theatre, there was a dispute between the members of the orchestra on The Poet and After The Day, which had orchestration for,” Lees recalls.
“They were arguing with the conductor in rehearsal saying, ‘You didn’t tell us about this bit.’ They were expecting it to stop after The Poet and wouldn’t play the big rock outro, so we played our version of the whole thing and it was every bit as powerful. It was their loss,” he says with a laugh.
The first person to orchestrate Barclay James Harvest’s music was Robert John Godfrey, later of The Enid. Martyn Ford made subsequent orchestrations and most recently Ellin had an input, with some suggestions from the band. Each orchestrator has left their personal stamp on the arrangements.
image [https://cdn.magzter.com/1625747790/1729078929/articles/oXtHIIZ_i1729411475074/4049998989.jpg]
“We were lucky to have the original scores,” says Lees. “But the main thing was some of the original parts were quite testing, right on the limits, and I think Ben made those a bit kinder for the orchestra. Plus he did some of the newer tunes that didn’t have orchestration.”
Moonwater from Baby James Harvest (1972) was essentially a solo piece written and orchestrated by the late Woolly Wolstenholme, who sang much of it in falsetto. But on Philharmonic! his parts are sung by guest singer and soprano Eleanor Sandars.
“[Woolly] went to London to do the recording,” Lees recalls of the original. “And bless him, it must hav...
“Woolly Wolstenholme would play tenor horn as well as keyboards, I’d play recorder and Les [Holroyd] had the cello as well as bass. It set us aside, gave us something a little bit different than other people who were setting off in that progressive music scene.”
But as the 60s moved into the 70s, the group’s classical leanings developed and their ambition quickly outgrew these tentative beginnings. Their self-titled 1970 debut album featured the grandly named Barclay James Harvest Symphony Orchestra, and they became the first rock band to tour with a full orchestra – an exercise that made their name but almost bankrupted them.
“The songs had a quality of melody that lent themselves to being orchestrated and I think that’s been an ongoing thing,” says Lees.
In September 2023, as John Lees’ Barclay James Harvest, the group played their first full orchestral concert in the UK for 50 years at Huddersfield Town Hall with the Slaithwaite Philharmonic, conducted by Benjamin Ellin. The extremely well-received show has yielded the recently released CD and DVD set, Philharmonic! The Orchestral Concert.
“It was a lovely idea, because it’s a local orchestra to us,” Lees explains. “They’re amateur musicians, but they’re retired professionals as well, so they’re no slouches.”
The idea of the concert was prompted by “pressure from friends” after the band played two sold-out nights in 2018 at the Herodeon Theatre, Athens, an amphitheatre in the shadow of the Acropolis – perhaps the ultimate prog concert setting – along with the Athens State Orchestra augmented by musicians from the Prague Philharmonic.
“The view from the stage was a floodlit Acropolis. How often do you get the chance to play there?” Lees says. “We look back at the photographs and it’s just ridiculous.”
Bass player and vocalist Craig Fletcher is with Lees in his studio. He still refers to himself as the “new boy, the apprentice”, having only been in the band since 1998 – when Lees and original bass guitarist Les Holroyd parted ways and then ran two different versions of the band. He shares his memories of the evening.
“I usually speak to the audience while John settles in,” he explains. “I said, ‘Good evening, everybody. I’m sure you know who we are. For those that don’t, we come from a small fishing village in England called Manchester. It’s very similar to this, except our weather is a lot better’, and they all went ‘Waaaggh!’ It was the most gorgeous setting with the moon just beginning to come up, a balmy 20°C evening. One of the best things I’ve ever done.”
Back in the 1970s, rock bands playing with an orchestra was a rarity and could be an uneasy alliance. Classical musicians didn’t always take this new musical hybrid seriously. During rehearsals for the 1969 première of Jon Lord’s Concerto For Group and Orchestra, where Deep Purple combined with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, one of the cellists flounced out of rehearsals, likening it to “a second-rate Beatles”. When Camel played The Snow Goose at the Royal Albert Hall in 1975 with the London Symphony Orchestra,
Andy Latimer recalled two French horn players getting bored, talking to each other and playing out of tune. On a more practical level, Rick Wakeman experienced problems in timing that can arise from a rock band who play on the beat with an orchestra that tends to play behind it, when rehearsing Journey To The Centre Of The Earth with the LSO in 1973.
Although Barclay James Harvest produced one of the most successful amalgams of rock and classical music, they initially experienced timing issues with the Barclay James Harvest Symphony Orchestra, who were music students.
“I think the musicians, and the conductors, are more attuned to it now,” says Lees. “Ben [Ellin] was directing and conducting the and there were no timing issues; it sat very well. We were watching him, but I remember in the early concerts with the Barclays, it was us and them. The conductor was for them and you didn’t take that much notice. We got away with it mostly, but in certain songs we didn’t, like Dark Now My Sky, if you listen to some of the original EMI recordings, you can hear there’s a bit of a wobble in timing.”
image [https://cdn.magzter.com/1625747790/1729078929/articles/oXtHIIZ_i1729411475074/0142880984.jpg]
“There were not so much issues, but occasional bits of uncertainty, which Ben and Kev [Whitehead] the drummer worked out,” says Fletcher. “Kevin said, ‘I’ll do a four hi-hat count there’, and Ben had that in the cans [his headphones] and the orchestra came in perfectly.”
The band also had to rearrange and edit their own parts in some of the songs for these orchestral performances. They encountered a bit of a problem during the Athens shows.
“When we did the Herodeon Theatre, there was a dispute between the members of the orchestra on The Poet and After The Day, which had orchestration for,” Lees recalls.
“They were arguing with the conductor in rehearsal saying, ‘You didn’t tell us about this bit.’ They were expecting it to stop after The Poet and wouldn’t play the big rock outro, so we played our version of the whole thing and it was every bit as powerful. It was their loss,” he says with a laugh.
The first person to orchestrate Barclay James Harvest’s music was Robert John Godfrey, later of The Enid. Martyn Ford made subsequent orchestrations and most recently Ellin had an input, with some suggestions from the band. Each orchestrator has left their personal stamp on the arrangements.
image [https://cdn.magzter.com/1625747790/1729078929/articles/oXtHIIZ_i1729411475074/4049998989.jpg]
“We were lucky to have the original scores,” says Lees. “But the main thing was some of the original parts were quite testing, right on the limits, and I think Ben made those a bit kinder for the orchestra. Plus he did some of the newer tunes that didn’t have orchestration.”
Moonwater from Baby James Harvest (1972) was essentially a solo piece written and orchestrated by the late Woolly Wolstenholme, who sang much of it in falsetto. But on Philharmonic! his parts are sung by guest singer and soprano Eleanor Sandars.
“[Woolly] went to London to do the recording,” Lees recalls of the original. “And bless him, it must hav...
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Prog (Digital) - 1 Issue, Issue 154