A tragedy

[Xpensive Wino]

 

[Xpensive Wino]

​

Nick Drake (1948 - 1974) was a genius. His music inspires me everyday. The world is: I'm lost for words. Really. His music is both tragic and beautiful. Like a Shakespeare play.

- Mark Keeble

 

[MarcB]

If you think the string quartet sounds very spooky on the recordings..you’d be correct .. it’s because the producer knew the quartet that played on all the old hammer house of horror scores and asked them to play on Nick’s sessions.

 

[Xpensive Wino]

If you think the string quartet sounds very spooky on the recordings..you’d be correct .. it’s because the producer knew the quartet that played on all the old hammer house of horror scores and asked them to play on Nick’s sessions.

Harry only arranged one track on Five Leaves Left, mon frere.

In his memoir White Bicycles, (a highly recommended read about his musical endeavours in the 1960s), producer Joe Boyd recalled: “One evening Nick played me all his songs. Up close, the power of his fingers was astonishing, with each note ringing out loud and clear in the small room. I had listened closely to Robin Williamson, John Martyn, Bert Jansch and John Renbourn. Half-struck strings and blurred hammerings-on were an accepted part of their sound. None could match Nick’s mastery of the instrument. After finishing one song he would re-tune the guitar and proceed to play something equally complex in a totally different chord shape.” An example of that mastery is Cello Song, also featuring Clare Lowther on cello (she also played on early Fairport Convention albums).

When Boyd heard the demos, he was thinking of Leonard Cohen’s debut LP, released in 1967. Although very different from Drake’s album, there is something in the mantra-like quality of the songs on Leonard Cohen’s album that made a connection in Boyd’s mind. Songs like Suzanne featured a delicate string arrangement that inspired Boyd to seek an arranger.

His first choice was Richard Hewson, who had worked with the Beatles on The Long And Winding Road, but after listening to the sessions he recorded with Hewson’s arrangements, they were found too middle-of-the-road.

Drake, the epitome of a shy, reserved and soft-spoken personality, quietly suggested his Cambridge friend Robert Kirby.

Kirby arranged the stringed instruments for several tracks.

Kirby had a different sensibility about what type of arrangements to write for Nick’s songs. Instead of using a full orchestra, he wrote the arrangements for a string sextet, resulting in a more intimate sound. Given that the vocals and the sextet were recorded together, it is amazing how clearly you can hear each of the instruments and the quality of their tone. Day is Done is a great example of how the vocals, guitar and strings work together. This young undergraduate surprised everyone with his accomplished arrangements, which had such an empathy with Drake’s intentions.

There was one song, however, that he felt unable to confidently approach, and that was River Man. River Man was the one song on the album that Robert Kirby could not come up with a deserving arrangement for.

Drake wrote a mysterious guitar line in the odd meter of 5/4, played in groupings of 3-2. Bassist Danny Thompson had no trouble accompanying the song, but Kirby could not work in that odd meter. In an interview in MOJO magazine, he said: “Brubeck’s Take Five aside, that was the only time in my life I’d heard a piece of music consistently in 5/4. I could not for the life of me work out how to write a piece of music that didn’t stagger along like a spider missing a leg, how you crossed over and missed the bar lines”.

This is one of a handful of songs which totally encapsulate Drake’s style - melancholy, unresolved, washed out, drifting from major to minor on words that speak of some deep, hidden malaise.

The strings needed to be equal to it, so the budget was stretched and veteran film and television composer, band leader and arranger Harry Robinson was drafted in.

John Wood, the balance engineer on all three of Drake’s studio albums, had suggested that the string orchestration assignment be handed to Robinson, a composer whose speciality was writing scores for Hammer horror films. Wood told Joe and Nick that Robinson was "a great mimic" and all you had to do was "name a composer you like" and Robinson could copy that style.

Drake was taken by the music of English composer Frederick Delius, who is known for writing strings parts with long, sustained chords and quiet endings to many of his compositions., and Robinson nailed the style on demand.

Boyd’s memoir recalls: “Nick and I went to visit Robinson at his house hidden in the middle of Barnes Common, just below the tree that was to kill Marc Bolan ten years later. Having heard a tape, Robinson was already intrigued when we arrived. Nick played the song through, then strummed chords as the tape played, showing Harry the textures he wanted for the string parts. I had never heard him so articulate or so demanding. Harry made notes and nodded".

The result was a track which – next to the famous 1999 Volkswagen ad featuring ‘Pink Moon’ – is the most often played and discussed of all Nick’s songs.

Boyd recalls, "In later years, Harry would talk about the day we recorded it, with Nick surrounded by the orchestra, playing and singing while Harry conducted – just like Nelson Riddle and Frank Sinatra.”

Joe Boyd

When British traditional music got a dose of rock & roll excitement, it was an American who sat in the producer's chair. Oh, and Joe Boyd also discovered a little-known band called the Pink Floyd...

www.soundonsound.com

Five Leaves Left, by Nick Drake

On September 24, 1969, Fairport Convention played a live show that gave the world a preview of their album Liege and Lief, released a few months later and now considered a staple album in the emerging British folk rock revival of the late 60. The circumstances surrounding the recording of the...

musicaficionado.blog

http://stringsection.co.uk/2013/06/23/part-2-nick-drake-string-arrangements-on-five-leaves-left/

http://stringsection.co.uk/2013/07/08/part-3-nick-drake-string-arrangements-on-bryter-layter/

 

[MarcB]

That was the only bit of information I retained from a Nick Drake convention at the south back years ago.. lol

 

[Xpensive Wino]

That was the only bit of information I retained from a Nick Drake convention at the south back years ago.. lol

https://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/

 

[MarcB]

https://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/

I have a bit of a blocked nose right now..

Bondjor