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Remembering Jon Lord three months after his passing16 October 2012, 23:23
"My first chance to meet Jon Lord dates back to 1991, when Deep Purple's Slaves And Masters tour reached Budapest. I had seen him perform with the classic Mk2 (then Mk5) line-up of Purple 4 years back too, but this time I also had the opportunity to meet him personally. And I blew it! I was sitting in the lobby of the Budapest Hilton waiting for DP members to show up, when I suddenly caught sight of Jon's characteristic figure walking towards the lifts. I was only 18, quite shy, and he was my hero (I was a keyboardist then!), so you can imagine. I chickened out. I only managed to murmur the words "Hi Jon" very quietly, which of course he didn't hear (especially as I was quite a distance away too), and then all I could do was watch him walk slowly into one of the lifts with his distinctive pony-tail on his back and disappear. I remember thinking I probably screwed up my only chance to meet my all-time favourite keyboard player.
Then when Deep Purple came to rock Budapest over and over again, I always found a way to meet the members for a couple of autographs and a little chat, so I had the opportunity to talk to Ian Gillan, Roger Glover, and Ian Paice a few times, and when Cry Free was "officially" introduced to Deep Purple in 2003, we all got the chance to party with Rog and Steve Morse too. However, on these occasions I never got to meet Jon, and of course in 2003 it wouldn't even have been possible as he had already left the band by then. So it seemed very likely that I would have to live with the fact that those few seconds at the Hilton back in 1991 would be the only time I was fortunate enough to spend with Jon Lord, the person, along with the great many fantastic experiences with Jon Lord, the musician, as a fan, of course. Then sometime during the summer of 2008, almost two decades later, my phone rang, and it was Bogdan Gomilko, boss of Hungarian booking agency Livesound Productions with the question, if he managed to bring Jon Lord's symphonic project to Hungary, would we be able to take on the role of 'group' in Lord's Concerto for Group and Orchestra. Now "the rest is history", as they say, and we will always be grateful to Bogdan for the friendship of this great man as well as all the incredible musical experiences and other adventures that awaited us with Jon in the following three years.
But back to the story! It's time for me to give you a report about the second personal encounter with the guy with the pony-tail (which had turned white from brown in the meantime), especially as this time it was a real encounter as well as a defining moment, and not only for me. It is 3 March 2009, and a large, all-Hungarian group of Danubia Symphonics, conductor Márton Rácz, and Cry Free is waiting for the star of their show, tuning instruments and chatting away casually until suddenly there is silence: Jon Lord has entered the hall. In case you didn't know, a complete symphony orchestra comprises 70 or 80 people, plus there are, of course, managers, promoters, journalists and assistants around, and in this case a rock band too, i.e. us. So altogether about a hundred people went completely quiet at the sight of the Maestro arriving. Such was the presence of Jon! He didn't even need to say a word, so authoritative was his character in the good sense. His tall and manly stature, his charisma, the carefully combed back and shining white hair, his ever immaculate appearance which was always sporty and elegant at the same time, and his whole figure of a man radiated determination, self-confidence, and power, as well as optimism and humour. And when he did start talking, the effect was intensified, as his distinctive baritone voice, quite strong and yet very pleasant for the ear, quickly placed him in the centre of conversation, especially as the content of his communication always had something fascinating for his audience too.
Then, on 3 March 2009, at the rehearsal, he simply stepped over to us, who were piled up in the corner of that big hall with our drums and guitars awestruck, and in a cool and funny manner just said, stating the obvious, "You must be the band". He shook hands with all of us, and gave us an encouraging smile each, which started a long-term cooperation at a level which is absolutely exceptional. During our career reaching over 17 years now, we've had the fortune to work with quite a few stars, both Hungarian and international, and some of them really very nice people, but Jon stands out of all of them, being ever so patient, so supportive, and so generous with his time. We had 14 concerts with him, during which we worked with 9 different symphony orchestras and 7 conductors altogether, and we were always surrounded by numerous staff members on the management side as well. If we count all the people that Jon had to work with during the 14 shows, we'll end up somewhere around 1000! And he always had a few kind words to each and every one of them, a praise, a smile, an encouraging or supporting sentence, or a joke to crack them up if they were nervous or shy. But of course, on those few occasions when it was necessary, he could also be a demanding director. I will never forget for instance when somewhere during the first Jon Lord Tour of Russia the classical percussionists were playing a fortissimo part really softly and idly, and the Maestro stamped on their wooden raiser with a big bang, shouting "Come on!". But these incidents were really rare and never without a reason. Jon was a real pro, and yet he enjoyed every minute of what he was doing. He was the ultimate star without the mannerisms of a star.
But back to that March day once again. The rehearsal was nearing its end, and Jon looked more and more pleased, smiling under his moustache, knowing that there would be no trouble with the Budapest concerts. He saw how confident conductor Rácz was, and sensed how carefully selected each musician of the Danubia Symphonics was, and probably also heard from Cry Free's performance how we had spent almost every day of the previous three months with our instruments in our hands at home and in the rehearsal room. Jon was always very generous with compliments during playing too, so we could see dozens of the 'thumbs up' signal as well as acknowledging nods all the time. Jon was the second "conductor" of the show, or as he liked to call himself, "The First Officer of the ship" besides the "Captain", and I couldn't have imagined a more supportive musical director than him. Hard work with him also meant constant fun and sheer enjoyment. And at the end of the rehearsal the Maestro said that short line we like to quote proudly, "I've had concerts before that weren't sounding as good as this rehearsal".
Later that day I had the chance to talk to him more informally about the rehearsal, and Jon gladly acknowledged how good the symphony orchestra was, and I couldn't stop myself from adding, "And the girls are quite pretty too". The Maestro went, "You think I didn't notice?". Hahaha, I thought I would be cool, but the old Maestro beat me by far! And that was not the last time he made me laugh, and not the last time the topic of ladies came up. Jon had a fantastic sense of humour, and I guess a great admiration for women, but of course in his English gentlemanly way. But maybe it's even cooler that this attraction was mutual! We kept hearing from young female fans how sexy Jon was, and that they weren't actually thinking of him as the kind, old, grandpa figure, but the attractive and gorgeous man! But I'll leave that topic for the girls, and go on with my story! :-)
Next up it was a tour of Slovakia, which was a funny one. Originally we were supposed to be Jon's band again, but the local managers insisted that a Slovakian rock band should be playing with him. Fair enough, we went on with our own stuff until one day before the first Bratislava show my phone rang with Bogdan's voice in it again. "Attila, the Slovakian band can't play the Concerto, can you get Cry Free to Bratislava early next morning?". "What?!" But, of course, I could, and we showed up the next morning with all our gear to meet a very grateful Jon Lord, who hugged us each tightly, and said: "Thank you for saving my concert". And saving the two Slovakian shows was indeed what we did, but we didn't think of ourselves as saviours, we thought we were lucky dogs! :-) And this was the tour during which we had a lot of opportunities to chat with Jon over cups of coffee and glasses of wine in the breaks, and we even had time for some deeper conversations about more philosophical topics, and got to know in fact how wise and how spiritual Jon was. And of course we had a lot of laugh over old Deep Purple anecdotes that he shared with us.
The next Jon Lord tour took us to Russia, where we played Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Yekaterinburg (on the other side of the Ural mountain, in Asia). Naturally such a tour is an amazing cultural experience, and Jon was joking about this as we were standing in front of the beautiful Winter Palace in St. Petersburg, "I take you to some nice places, don't I?". We invited our wives to meet us in Moscow to kind of reward them for all their patience when they had been listening to the Concerto and the other Lord compositions at home all day, every day for months, and this time it was their turn to get amazed by Jon's fantastic personality, as he greeted them with such warmness and friendship. We also got to meet the Lords, as Jon invited his family over to the Russian capital too.
After the first seven concerts we'd grown to be a real team. Singers Steve Balsamo and Kasia Łaska, Jon and us. The initial careful politeness changed to a completely casual and friendly relationship. We'd become real colleagues who are always happy to meet, and who can get over any obstacle that may come about. Next up it was the Hungarian city of Győr, where we almost managed to get brother-in-laws Ian Paice and Jon Lord on the same stage (as we were performing there with them on two subsequent days), then Imst in the Austrian Alps where we finally had the chance to get (slightly) drunk with Jon at the afterparty, and then the Palace Of Arts in Budapest again for the incredible Sarabande premiere, followed by the second Russian Tour (this time feat. Anna Phoebe on violin too), which we even let you follow all the way through with the help of our popular Video Diary.
Last summer brought Jon to our national Gastroblues Festival in Paks with his Blues Project, where he was accompanied by his old British musician friends, and not us, but of course we went down there to meet him and check out his act. In a way we were also involved in the production again, as we provided the keyboard gear (Hammond C3 and Leslie 760) for the Maestro. I was there when our then new organist Norbert Soós had his instrument signed by Jon, and I heard another cool sentence from him that I will never forget. It was after I had explained to Jon that Norbert is a bit shy in character (especially when meeting his hero, just like I was at the Hilton 20 years before) that Jon said, "If you wanna be a Hammond player, you can't be shy". How true! It was strange to meet Jon in this "other" environment as a "quasi-outsider", which he also remarked, but we were really glad to see each other.
And that was the last time I saw him... A few weeks later came the news of his serious disease. After that we exchanged a couple of letters full of love, hope, and faith, but later on we only had information about him and his health from the media too. First all the good news about his successful therapy and his potential recovery, and then all of a sudden the shocking news of his death. The latter took place exactly three months ago, and since then we've been trying to come to terms with the inevitable, that the great man, fantastic musician, and dear friend who we loved so much is gone for good. Well, he may be gone, but not from our hearts for sure."