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FORGOTTEN HISTORY: Keith emerson | History Defined

“The Rolling Stones and The Beatles paid for theirs. I see no reason why you shouldn’t pay for yours”: When Keith Emerson tried to blag a £55,000 synth for free

The keyboard genius’ relationship with engineer Robert Moog may have had a shaky start, but it paid dividends to both men – and countless followers

Louder

“People often crack jokes about that album. We had that dreadful picture on the cover with the three of us looking like the Bee Gees, and I’m thinking, ‘This is wrong’”: Carl Palmer on the disastrous album that led ELP to break up

Keith Emerson called it “an embarrassment against everything I’ve worked for”

MusicRadar

Keith Emerson called it “an embarrassment against everything I’ve worked for”

MusicRadar

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“It’s one of the first classic rock ’n’ roll videos. But we were absolutely freezing. It was about 30 below!”: Carl Palmer on ELP’s greatest hit and their glory years as stadium-filling superstars

“We played California Jam and 120,000 people paid and another 100,000 smashed down the fences and broke in”

MusicRadar

“He was a brilliant concert-level classical pianist and also the best rocker you could get, for keyboards. So he was an absolute hero”: Howard Jones on the synth legend who inspired him, and the influence he had on one of his biggest hits

“I saw the classical music as my way to get good at playing the pop and rock stuff,” he says

MusicRadar

“Steve Lukather’s guitar collided with a mic stand. He banked the guitar against it and made it a feature of the song. I don’t even understand!” Toto’s Dennis Atlas and his star-studded solo album

Listen to Principle and you’ll hear Bumblefoot, David Paich, Marco Minneman and others, plus Keith Emerson, Rick Wakeman and Jordan Rudess influences

Louder

A new petition calls on the BBC to recognise and celebrate the compositional talents of Keith Emerson

ELP will be celebrated at this year's BBC Proms season's Prog Rock: A Fanfare For The Common Man, which takes place at the Royal Albert Hall on July 18

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Emerson, Lake & Palmer announce newly remastered reissue of Works Live

Carl Palmer will bring his An Evening With Emerson, Lake & Palmer to England for three shows in February 2027

Louder

“I’d get thrown out then brought back in. I just couldn’t play in a conventional way”: Japan’s Richard Barbieri on coloured hair, lipstick, a fingerless glove and the unusual reason he joined the band

Future Porcupine Tree member recalls being put off playing keyboards by Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman, and feeling culturally homeless before the new romantic era

Louder

“He cannot do that – it’s a criminal act! This is destroying classical music!”: Orchestral players were horrified by Keith Emerson’s work. But times have changed, says acclaimed conductor

Terje Mikkelsen was once told to avoid the ELP icon’s material. He ignored that advice, and went on to collaborate with Emerson himself

Louder

“He said, ‘The music is one thing, but we’re here to put on a show.’ And that’s what he did”: Keith Emerson’s manager wanted to ditch plans for a flying piano. Emerson proved him wrong

Backstage boss Stewart Young took one look at the prototype in 1974 and decided to walk away – but the keyboard maestro wouldn’t have it

Louder

Carl Palmer announces An Evening With Emerson, Lake & Palmer shows in England for February 2027

Carl Palmer will perform live with late band members Keith Emerson and Greg Lake appearing in sync on screens on either side of the stage

Louder

“Professional pianists are the only ones who say, ‘I understand why he wanted to kill himself. I would think the same thing’”: Keith Emerson’s partner says his health issues were caused by his fear of letting people down

Mari Kawaguchi remembers hearing his best-ever performance of Tarkus in a Japanese dive bar, where the critics couldn’t hurt him

Louder

“I opened the curtains a bit and said, ‘Look at all these people who’ve paid to see us!’ I didn’t realise that was the worst thing I could have done”: Carl Palmer on Keith Emerson, and how his death wasn’t the worst part of losing him

They met when Palmer stood in with Fleetwood Mac for a show with The Nice. Half a century of amazing music and friendship followed. The drummer reveals what they’d be doing today if Emerson was still alive

Louder

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We celebrate Keith Emerson on the cover of the new issue of Prog Magazine, which is on sale now!

Plus Francis Dunnery, Pat Metheny, Gong, Clive. Nolan, Soft Machine, Ulver, Bill Nelson's Orchestra Futura, Godsticks, Magnus Martin and loads more...

Louder

“What Keith Moon did on drums, he did on keyboards. Without him the genre would be much poorer”: When Geoff Downes saw Keith Emerson live, he found immediate inspiration

The Yes man hails ELP counterpart as a musician and entertainer

Guitar World

“Playing with Vince Neil, opening for Van Halen, it got to be total rock ’n’ roll excess. I had to reassess why I was even playing guitar”: Steve Stevens on resisting shred, how Paco de Lucia made him go nylon, and Billy Idol’s eternal appeal

Billy Idol’s collaborator of 40-plus years transcends the punk-rock guitarist mold, taking in flamenco, jazz‑fusion, prog and classical styles – and he is as excited aboutguitar today as he was when he first picked one up

Louder

“The publisher told us to forget it. But I didn’t give up so easily – I got his home number and called him”: How Emerson, Lake and Palmer charted with Aaron Copland’s Fanfare For The Common Man in the year of punk

Even cut down to a third of its length, the 1977 track became their biggest hit, and one of the most successful instrumental single of all time

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"A picture-postcard Christmas, with morbid edges..." New animated video released for Greg Lake's perennial seasonal favourite I Believe In Father Christmas

Greg Lake's I Believe In Father Christmas originally reached No. 2 in the UK singles chart in 1975

Louder

“We made bad albums. Two of them should be melted down into flowerpots. But how many great pieces of artwork are you going to create in your career?” What Carl Palmer really thinks of ELP

Comparing his band to Yes and Pink Floyd, the sole surviving member looks back on OTT productions, getting carried away with overdubs and constant criticism – but insists: “We were setting a standard”

Louder

“If you want to play that kind of music, play it on your solo album. I’m not interested”: In 1971 Greg Lake enraged Keith Emerson, who immediately quit ELP. The result was their acclaimed album Tarkus

Carl Palmer recalls a crisis meeting, arguments over time signatures, and playing the whole album top to bottom in the studio – only to discover their engineer had taken a break

Louder

"We'd been going down well until that happened": How The Nice offended Leonard Bernstein and the US Embassy

The story of the song that crystallised the burgeoning prog-rock movement and turned The Nice into one of the most controversial bands of the day

Louder

"I was blown away!" The greatest prog albums, as chosen by prog legend Geoff Downes

He's been in The Buggles, Yes and Asia – but what does Geoff Downes consider the finest prog albums ever?

Louder

“People say Genesis ended when Peter Gabriel left, or when Steve Hackett left. But he was the anchor that everything else revolved around”: An appreciation of Tony Banks, by John Boegehold

Pattern-Seeking Animals keyboardist praises Banks’ ear, taste and understatement, which he argues is essential to everything Genesis achieved

Louder

“I strive to get away from the Genesis vibe. But it’s so deeply ingrained… I’ve been doing it longer than Peter Gabriel was in the band!” Nad Sylvan is more himself than ever on solo album Monumentata

Best known for his12 years with Steve Hackett, the US-born Swede explores his own life and times at last. And is that a Pink Floyd reference as sings about being frontman and sideman in someone else’s project?

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