Short
biography:
Short
biography:
John Tout is probably the most modest keyboard
player of the 70's generation of symphonic rock bands. Even for a short
biography like this there is hardly any information available. Usually
the voice of Annie Haslam and the compositions of Michael Dunford/Betty
Thatcher get all the attention, thus neglecting the brilliant playing of
Tout. He is credited as co-writer of only a few Renaissance songs, and
"Fanfare" and the wonderful "Fugue for the sultan" from "Song of Scheherezade"
appear to be his only real compositions during his time with Renaissance.
This is hard to believe, considering the enormous impact his playing has
had on the music of Renaissance.
John Tout joined Renaissance at the end of 1970, shortly after the
departure of John Hawken. It appears that he had played in a band called
Ruperts People prior to Renaissance. As is obvious from the German TV special
(ZDF) from 1971, both Dunford and Tout were the link between the "Yardbirds-Renaissance"
and what turned out to become the classic Renaissance. His most striking
contribution to the band is, of course, his classically oriented piano
playing, opening quite a few Renaissance songs and referring to some great
Russian and French composers. But also his organ and synthesizer playing
is characterised by virtuosity. It is creative, technically outstanding,
dynamic and dominant. Many Renaissance fans don't think much of Azure d'or
(1979), but personally I think it is a wonderful record, as Tout experiments
with the Yamaha CS80, the emperor among the synthesizers. On Azure d'or
Tout shows a much more modern side of his playing than he could do on the
classically oriented records of Renaissance, and with the (controversial)
song The Discovery, he even provides a gorgeous pastiche of Rick Wakeman's
style of playing. "Camera Camera", the first Renaissance album after Tout's
departure, has many shortcomings, but the biggest is to me the absence
of Tout.
At the end of 1980, after a short tour through Israel, Tout decides
to retire from the music business. He becomes an employee of British Telecom,
and nothing was heard from him for many years. Only after the music of
Renaissance had attracted major attention again on the Internet in 1996,
thanks to people like Joe Lynn and Brian Dorbuck, there is a sign a life
again. Initially, Tout teamed up again with drummer Terry Sullivan,
who had left Renaissance shortly after Tout, and it seems that they are preparing
a new album. This led to a short-lived reunion of Renaissance and a brand new studio album, Tuscany, on which Tout guested on three songs. Surely it is no coincidence that these three are the best tracks of the album?!
Short discography:
| Renaissance: |  |
Other |
| Prologue (1972)
Ashes are burning (1973) Turn of the cards (1974) Scheherezade and other stories (1975) Live at Carnegie Hall (1976) Novella (1977) Song for all seasons (1978) Azure d'or (1979) At the Royal Albert Hall pt. 1 (1997) At the Royal Albert Hall pt. 2 (1997) Tuscany (2000) |
John Lennon: Imagine (1971)
Wishbone Ash: Argus (1972) Shoot: On the frontier (1973) Roy Wood's Wizzard: Indiana Rainbow/The thing is this, (this is the thing) (1976) Louis Clark: (per-spek'tiv)n (1979) Renaissant: South of winter (2004) |
Important compositions/contributions:
Prologue (Prologue)
Can you understand? (Ashes are burning)
At the harbour (Ashes are burning)
Running hard (Turn of the cards)
A trip to the fair (Scheherezade)
Fugue for the sultan (Scheherezade)
The captive heart (Novella)
Kindness (at the end) (A song for all seasons)
A song for all seasons (A song for all seasons)
The winter tree (Azure d'or)
The discovery (Azure d'or)
Other WWW pages about John Tout:
