LIVE AT THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL WITH THE ROYAL PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA PART 2

Reviewing this album is difficult. For those of you who are new to Renaissance may I suggest you start off with one of the band's studio albums (Tales of 1001 Nights, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 is my recommendation). Even though the band does an excellent performance live there are small suttleties that will be missed if you are not familiar with the studio versions of the songs. For those of you who are familiar with Renaissance I recommend this over 'Live at Carnegie Hall.' [I have not heard the Live BBC Sessions album released by Wounded Bird label (USA) - it was not recorded at a concert hall in front of a paying audience.] What really stands out is the London Philharmonic Orchestra. They do an excellent job under the baton of Harry Rabinowitz who arranged all the orchestra instruments for this live performance. It really shows that the band is enjoying the concert espically Annie Haslam's vocal variations (no lyrics sung). "Touching Once" is really exceptional here in my opinion. "Midas Man" is a difficult song to perform with sparse instrumentation and demanding backup vocals. I could hear that Jon was not sufficiently warmed up to backup Annie's soaring - beautiful vocals. I have to say that I am somewhat disappointed with "Ashes are Burning." It seems that Jon Camp (Elect. Bass Guitar) was not able to keep up. There timing seemed to go off and Terry Sullivan was trying to keep the rest of the band members in time. It was good to hear John Tout (Keyboards) stretch out and show his talent to a hometown audience. I think the problem is "Ashes are Burning" was expected to be played at every live concert they did - maybe they just were burned out by having to play it all the time? Repeating "Prologue" is not a good idea in my opinion. The orchestral version on Vol. 1 is a refereshing change. The Jan. 1979 (N.J.) version would have been better as a bonus track - it was recorded two years after this concert. "You - part 1 & 2" was on the "Songs from Renaissance Days" album. It seems the label used this as a fill track. It was recorded in 1982 in England with only Dunford/Haslam/Camp - not representative of the band line-up in October 1977! Overall I would say if you want a live album of Renaissance (classic line-up) then I would pick this one. The major drawback is the microphones feeding back. I find it quite distracting. The second release of this album does not have the picture of Michael Dunford on the front cover - there are no photos at all and no detailed liner notes. Enjoy!