Fife and Scotland - the offbeat perspective

There is no doubt Scotland has always been blessed with talented music makers and perhaps owing to a Celtic heritage in which music played a major part of entertainment during the long dark hours of winter. Having said that, one would naturally expect most Scottish music compositions to be limited and linked to 'folk music' and for most part, it often is, and designed to be performed by a small number of musicians. In Britain, we are more likely to associate far grander productions with Andrew Lloyd Webber than ever consider similar genius in Scotland. This is the story of a man born in Scotland whose musical compositions were often featured in the 'hit parade' of the 1960s, the 'Top of the Pops' in the 1970s, co-founder of the Alan Parsons Project that sold fifty million albums in the eighties and nineties yet still found time to write five successful stage musicals attaining international acclaim. Sadly, and like many of our best heroes, Eric Woolfson, and even in wake of his death, commands more foreign respect than in the land of his birth. He was born to a Jewish family on 18th March 1945 at Charing Cross in Glasgow and named Eric Norman Woolfson. He was educated at the High School of Glasgow and raised in the Polloksheilds area of that city.

He started composing music in his early teens and moved to London where he found work as a session pianist at the age of 18. The record producer for the Rolling Stones, Andrew Oldham signed him up as a songwriter. During the following years, Woolfson wrote songs for such artists as Marianne Faithfull, Frank Ifield, Joe Dassin, the Tremeloes, Marie (french singer), Scottish band Marmalade, Dave Perry and Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits.

During the 60's, he worked alongside two then-unknown writers, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. His songs were recorded by over 100 artists both in Europe and America.

In 1975, Woolfson joined forces with record producer Alan Parsons and where the World of Popular Music was changed forever. Previously Alan Parsons had been deeply involved in the creation of the iconic 'Dark Side Of The Moon' album by Pink Floyd and where his sound engineering skills had contributed greatly to the outcome. 'Dark Side Of The Moon' was destined to remain highly rated for nearly two years after its publication.

Eric and Alan formed a new kind of collaboration that would allow Parsons' engineering skills to be used to the fullest extent while allowing Woolfson to exploit his talents as a songwriter and lyricist. Initially it was a 'working title' for the collabortive project but later agreed upon since Eric was happy to shun the limelight.

“I am a writer and in common with many other writers, I prefer the shadows to the limelight.”

From 1976 to 1987, Woolfson and Parsons collaborated on the conception and lyrics for the first ten albums by the Alan Parsons Project and which reaped sales in excess of 50 million. In 1982, one radio announcer described the Alan Parsons Project as a guitar band and was suitably chastened by many listeners. Right from the start, the APP had been astonishingly different with most music written by Woolfson and Parsons and where, in the early albums in particular, all musical offerings carried tracks linked towards a common theme, and reflected in a style that Woolfson returned to much later in his life. Far from being 'just another guitar band', many of the compositions were elaborate and often using the Orchestra Of The Munich Opera conducted by Andrew Powell and even large choirs. Many 'guest' singers and artists featured on APP albums including Colin Blunstone, John Miles, Kiki Dee and Opera Singer Marti Webb, to name but a few. A modest exemplar discography using Internet links are given on this page.

While participating with Alan Parsons, Eric Woolfson would sing a vocal guide for each song and where the album's eventual lead vocalists would use this as a reference. Even from the start, lead guitar has often featured Ian Bairnson formerly of the Edinburgh group 'Pilot' and who may be the only person apart from Parsons and Woolfson to appear on every album. The influence of other bands also became part of the 'project' and where the impressive style of the 'Average White Band' from Dundee made a marked opening track on the first album. AWB's debut album in the US had already infuriated Bobby Brown to establish the 'Above Average Black Band' yet never meeting the long string of successes enjoyed by the British Band. Woolfson himself was the actual singer on many of the Project's biggest hits, such as "Time", "Don't Answer Me”, “Prime Time” and the band's signature tune "Eye In The Sky” which spent several weeks in the Top 3 of Billboards's Hot 100 in 1982.

'Freudiana' was originally meant to be the 11th album by The Alan Parsons Project, but Woolfson was keen to explore the possibility of realising the project as a musical. While recording the album, Brian Brolly was introduced to Woolfson and who promised to steer the album in this new direction. Brolly was previously a partner with Andrew Lloyd Webber, and together they created such musicals as 'Cats'. With some help from Brolly, Woolfson was able to turn 'Freudiana' into a stage musical. The eleventh APP album was created but before the Freudiana stage production opened in 1990 in Vienna, a double-length studio album was released. The musical had a successful run, and it was planned that the show would open in other cities. However, plans were put on hold when a lawsuit broke out between Brolly and Woolfson, each fighting for control of the project. By then, Woolfson was eager to write for musical theatre. He explained his career switch during an interview in 2004:

"I eventually developed The Alan Parsons Project as a vehicle but then I realised that there was more to it than that and that Andrew Lloyd Webber was right and that the stage musical was a fulfilling media for a writer like myself. I got into stage musicals in the mid-eighties." His musicals were mainly performed in Germany. This was for two reasons: The Alan Parsons Project was well known in Germany, and at that time the arts were very well funded there." His first musical about Sigmund Freud and called Freudiana premiered in Vienna in 1990.

The success of this first work led to Woolfson’s second musical 'Gaudi' concerning the Spanish architect Antonio Gaudi in 1995 and which ran for over five years in several German productions.

'Gambler', Woolfson’s third musical also premiered in Germany in 1996 and had a first run of over 500 performances. 'Gambler' also had six productions in Korea, two of which also toured Japan in 2002 and 2005; the first time a Korean language production had been staged in this way.

Discography

In this section, this FifeServe author has been naturally selective in his choice of links since the output of this composer has been prolific and covering many genres over many years. For the main part then, the links on this page relate to both the Alan Parsons Project and individual efforts by Eric Woolfson. Please bear in mind that sound and picture quality may be less than we'd normally expect in modern times.

Music
Performed by John Miles
Click Here To Watch This Performance

Eye In The Sky
The bearded one is Alan Parsons and lead singer is Colin Blunstone. The composer is hidden.
Click Here to watch this performance.

There But For The Grace Of God
The next example illustrates involvement within films like 'Final Fantasy'
Click Here To Watch This Performance.

Freudiana
Although visually unexciting, this link concerning the Freaudiana track provides excellent sound quality.
Click Here To Listen

La SeGrada Familia
Orchestral Feast: Lead Singer John Miles
Click Here To Watch This Performance

Don't Let The Moment Pass
Orchestral Feast: Lead Singer Marti Webb.
Click Here To Watch This Performance

Silence and I
Another Powerful Orchestral Example.
Click Here To Watch This You Tube Video

Ammonia Avenue
Global Environment Song: musical excellence! Rubbish Video!
Click Here To Listen

In The Lap Of The Gods
Choral and Orchestral Example
Click Here To Listen

Standing On Higher Ground
Another Mainstream Popular Music Offering.
Click Here To Watch The Video

Don't Answer Me
Cartoon featuring a 'cameo' appearance by Eric Woolfson
Click Here To Watch This Video

Mammagamma
Wholly Orchestral Offering from the APP.
Click Here For The Video

Oh Life!
Powerful Ballad from the APP.
Click Here To Listen

Woolfson was particularly inspired by author Edgar Allan Poe and the APP album arrived from this source but even after his association with the APP had ended, he wrote his fourth musical called 'POE' and based on the life of the author. It was given a World Premiere Concert at the Abbey Road Studios, London in 2003. An album was released in 2003 as 'POE More Tales of Mystery and Imagination' and a musical album CD 'Edgar Allan Poe' and DVD of the POE Abbey Road concert were released in 2009.

'Dancing with Shadows' was inspired by the anti-war play, 'Forest Fire' by the Korean playwright Cham Bum-Suk and with a book by Ariel Dorfman. It was premiered in July 2007 in Korea.

Eric Woolfson was married to Hazel from 1969 until his death from kidney cancer in London during the early hours of 2nd December 2009. He is survived by two daughters.