When Worlds Coalesce
Fine Music Magazine
I cannot have been the only teenager caught between two musical worlds, on the one hand the classical inclinations of my musician father, on the other, the temptations of some vibrant and innovative popular music. Fortunately, there were occasions when we ‘in-betweeners’ were catered for. In London in 1969, the Royal Albert Hall witnessed the premiere of Jon Lord’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra: there, in a concert which advance publicity billed as ‘When two worlds meet!’, Deep Purple and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra started off as stylistic antagonists and ultimately reached some kind of rapprochement.