Andy Long on 21st February 2003 [Other reviews]

The latest release from Rick Wakeman's Hope Vision is the 100-minute concert video The Piano Tour Live . This release features Rick's concert at the King's Church in Newport on the recent tour in it's entirety. Of course there is already a concert video available, Simply Acoustic (HRV 002), filmed in America. I met Rick at a recent gig in Swansea and asked him why he thought people might want to buy both releases. 'The British tour was very different from The American one,' he explained. 'We've tried to make sure that's reflected in the videos, so there are a lot of different pieces of music on them and different stories too. When I toured in America all the Churches had great P.A. systems and beautiful grand pianos so I played all the pieces on their pianos. Of course it's not like that in Britain, we had to take all our equipment with us so I had the chance to use other keyboards as well.' It is apparent from watching the videos that the presentation is vastly different and that, where there is repetition of material. For instance the two David Bowie pieces, Space Oddity and Life On Mars are arranged for electronic keyboards for the British video, giving them a more atmospheric feel, whereas the piano arrangement is more natural. Both videos contain a selection of Yes material but Simply Acoustic includes some of Rick's better known solo material, Catherine Howard and Merlin The Magician, whilst The Piano Tour Live includes the humorous Nursery Rhyme Concerto, and arrangements of The Lord's Prayer and The Day Thou Gavest Lord Has Ended. The film crew at King's Church have done a very impressive job so each of the videos has it's own merits. 9/10