VARIOUS ARTISTS – REMEMBERING GARY BROOKER (Esoteric/ Cherry Red) (2 x CD/Blu Ray/DVD) (2025)

As if we needed any reminders, I am re-reading Henry Scott-Irvine’s excellent book “Procol Harum: The Ghosts of A Whiter Shade of Pale” and how Gary Brooker played such a central role in Procol Harum and beyond, in his solo works and collaborations. I could not make the tribute concert on 4^th December, 2023 but managed to get hold of a programme and, finally, the music from that night has been released in a clamshell boxed set of Blu Ray and CDs. Gary played with many illustrious musicians and some of them can be heard on this moving tribute and charity concert.

It is perhaps surprising that the concert featured songs associated with the guest artists outnumbering the Procol Harum back catalogue. So, for example ‘Poison Ivy’, ‘Money for Nothing’ and ‘Wide Eyed and legless’ rub shoulders with ‘No More Fear of Flying’ and ‘Wall Street Blues’. For the record the Procol Harum numbers that are played are ‘Pandora’s Box’, ‘Homburg’, ‘Conquistador’, ‘A Salty Dog’ and ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’.

Still, ‘Remembering Gary Brooker’ is an important release and I am sure that the prolifically talented Procol Harum front man would have approved.