Reading all of the tributes really shows how far-reaching his influence was on so many people. It’s good to know. Sometimes when would get into music discussions with friends and brought up Vangelis, it seemed like I was the only one who knew who he was!
I remember sitting in a group with five radio pros, a morning guy, a PD, a consultant, and an engineer. The topic was "best artists"...and on the top of the list, the engineer puts...Enya. What a brilliant, unexpected answer, when somebody you would think is jaded to the industry, can take somebody like that who is so in the mainstream, yet out of the mainstream, and give them their propers. This is what Vangelis means to me: not that he did one hit single about dudes running along a beach, but for contributing a wealth of moods and styles through an electronic medium, that just as many music obsessives never really gave respect to.
The Enya choice is indeed brilliant. It makes sense for an engineer to acknowledge her, just from a technical standpoint alone. Her team really has succeeded in putting some of the most amazing sounds ever created to recorded media. It’s sonically interesting, which is one reason why I appreciate her music as well.
When Donna Summer's version came out, I loved the recording and assumed she was the first to record it. I never knew that it was originally a Jon & Vangelis song and only discovered this many years later. Although my musical taste are far more alligned with Jon & Vangelis' material that Donna Summer's I actually much prefer Ms Summers' version. It's a great song but don't I see the need for a further cover.
I thought the same with Tangerine Dream. But you’d be surprise how many people out there in different parts of the world that have heard the music of TD and other electronic musicians but didn’t quite know who played them. Maybe Vangelis was more well received than TD or KS’s music because his music was heard more on soundtracks or better movies? Regardless when I’m out wearing my TD, Kraftwerk, Steve Roach, etc tshirts I get a lot of reactions. And most didn’t realize that they are still involved and playing music.
The Moodswings version of "State Of Independence" with Chrissie Hynde is really good. Hell, the whole album is a great mix. It was re-titled as "Spiritual High", and the euphoric momentum towards the Martin Luther King speech is glorious.
Reading people's last respects, those rumours that Vangelis only released a small fraction of what he recorded appear to be true. In 1982 someone from a record label was with Vangelis and he noticed a lot of tapes sitting on a shelf. Bert van Breda (BR Music): In 1982 I started my own label and I will never forget looking at those rows of unreleased tapes in the studio and Vangelis' laughing said to me: 'that's a lot of releases for your label'. I think most of those recordings have still not come out, I hope his fans may see many more releases in the near future because The Maestro was unique in its compositions and recordings. That means a lot of Yamaha CS-80 synths and Vangelis playing real percussion from before 1982. I hereby officially offer myself as a candidate for going through the unreleased material in order to compile a few nice albums.
One of my all time favorite artists. To me if there was only one artist that I had to listen to only on a deserted island it would be Vangelis. Surprised not much love for Voices or Oceanic. I love those albums which came after 1492 ( which I also love) so the choral arrangements were getting more consistent and fuller. I just hope like with Prince that somebody takes over his estate and start releasing all the goodies that haven't been released or even heard and start putting out vinyl editions of his 90's output. Even special record store day releases. RIP Vangelis you were certainly one of a kind.
Oceanic takes me to a time and world of Art Deco and Voices is life affirming in an interplanetary way. Hard to put into words really. Both are exceptional.
Here’s another question for you on the other Esoteric remasters, including Page of Life. They are being reissued in September, being as I have the originals, is there any advantage in getting these….. You searched for Vangelis - Cherry Red Records
Depending on how much you like Jon Anderson, Page of Life is one to get, imho: This Esoteric Recordings release (undertaken with the full approval and supervision of Vangelis himself) features a rare and sought after bonus track, ‘Sing With Your Eyes’, released only as part of the highly limited and promotional ‘Wisdom Chain’ CD single in 1991.
If you're fond of the digipak format and you don't have the 2006/8 RCA Japanese remasters, these may be worthwhile. They're new pressings of Esoteric's 2013 remasters. (And, as @WhatDoIKnow pointed out, Page of Life comes with a hard-to-find bonus track.)
Any chance that some of the "never released" soundtracks finally get a release? Otherwise, his estate would be leaving a lot of money on the table. Would love to see a proper soundtrack for "The Bounty", as well as a more complete "1492" soundtrack. Also a multidisk release of the soundtrack to that Greek medical video release (Tegos Tapes).
If his estate would really want to respect and honor him, they'd go with the same attitude he's gone with while alive. Release nothing except what he wanted to. Also, soundtracks are a mess licencing-wise. If it didn't happen before, hard to happen now. The medical video was a private job and I guess they don't have the rights anymore.
If they were able to come to an understanding to get Bladerunner ST sussed out, I'm sure lesser known films could be handled without too much wrangling. It just takes the will to do so. Obviously if Vangelis submitted music for a soundtrack, he intended for it to be heard by people. Whether they're watching the corresponding film, or just laying in bed with headphones on should be irrelevant.
Err, not that much. First thing, BR was not just sorting out. There was an entire relaunch campaign because of the anniversary edition of the film was coming out. More money for everybody (starting with the film company), more motivation, bigger momentum. Second thing. The difference between headphones and theatre room is not at all irrelevant. Vangelis has been in record many times stating that a soundtrack and a record are different beasts that require different creative approach. Every ost album he worked with was a hard reworking of the original material. He didn't want the audience to hear it "one way or another". Quite the opposite.
Yeah, he drenched them with his post-1990 digital reverb, a very unfortunate decision. I didn't care for it on the records that had it when new.
Then he was being ridiculous. I know many people who at times will not watch a movie but just listen passively to the audio soundtrack while the film plays, some literally lying on the couch with eyeshades. I myself have done so. I guess Vangelis would have wanted to force me and those others to actually watch the movie to experience the music "his way". Were his OSTs works for hire? If so he had/has no say in what happens to them.
Just the opposite, really. He wanted to produce an album listening experience that was completely valid on its own, divorced from the movie although clearly derived from the work he'd done on the soundtrack. Keep in mind, he was also trying to fit the material within the ~45 minute constraint of the typical LP, at least up until the late '80s when that bloated up to the 74 minute runtime of a CD. Although there too, Vangelis opted to keep his soundtracks under 60 minutes (for example, 1492 is only 54 minutes long). I'm guessing he wanted to provide condensed versions of his work on each soundtrack that functioned as a coherent piece with a reasonable runtime. Nothing wrong with that, although I think starting with the era of the cheap CD - and especially with the arrival of streaming - it would have been nice if he'd also curated more-complete versions of his soundtrack work for fans and obsessives.
