John Keating (musician)
Encyclopedia
John Keating is a Scottish
musician
, songwriter
and arranger
.
After studying piano and trombone, he taught himself how to arrange and compose in his teens. He went to work with British big band leader Ted Heath
in 1952 as a trombone
player, but within two years Heath asked him to become his primary arranger. In the early 1960s, he and songwriter Johnny Worth (writing as "Les Vandyke") masterminded the career of a minor British pop star, Eden Kane
. The team wrote and produced a string of British top 10 hits for Kane in 1961-63. In addition he wrote, produced or arranged hits by Adam Faith
, Petula Clark
, Anthony Newley
, Sammy Davis Jr and many others.
Keating arranged and conducted a series of albums for London's Phase 4 series, notable for its use of synthesiser technology such as the Moog synthesizer
and the EMS VCS 3
. The records were often used as demonstration discs in the 1970s in Hi-Fi stores because of their quality. Much of his work was rereleased following the Lounge music
revival of the mid 1990s and its use as breakbeats.
His song "Bunny Hop" is featured in the 1994 Tim Burton
film
, Ed Wood
.
His "Theme from Z-Cars
", a #5 hit
in the UK Singles Chart
, was adopted by Everton
as their theme song
and remains so to this day.
As founder and principal of the Johnny Keating School of Music, Edinburgh, he has been directly responsible for the musical education of many students who later became successful professionals.
In 1999, he completed a four–volume academic reference book dedicated to the art of professional songwriting: Principles of Songwriting: A Study in Structure and Technique.
Scottish people
The Scottish people , or Scots, are a nation and ethnic group native to Scotland. Historically they emerged from an amalgamation of the Picts and Gaels, incorporating neighbouring Britons to the south as well as invading Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and the Norse.In modern use,...
musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
, songwriter
Songwriter
A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...
and arranger
Arrangement
The American Federation of Musicians defines arranging as "the art of preparing and adapting an already written composition for presentation in other than its original form. An arrangement may include reharmonization, paraphrasing, and/or development of a composition, so that it fully represents...
.
After studying piano and trombone, he taught himself how to arrange and compose in his teens. He went to work with British big band leader Ted Heath
Ted Heath (bandleader)
Ted Heath, musician and big band leader, led Britain's greatest post-war big band recording more than 100 albums and selling over 20 million records...
in 1952 as a trombone
Trombone
The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...
player, but within two years Heath asked him to become his primary arranger. In the early 1960s, he and songwriter Johnny Worth (writing as "Les Vandyke") masterminded the career of a minor British pop star, Eden Kane
Eden Kane
Eden Kane is an early 1960s British pop singer.-Life and career:Like Cliff Richard, Pete Best, and Engelbert Humperdinck, Eden Kane was born in India, but returned to Britain as a child...
. The team wrote and produced a string of British top 10 hits for Kane in 1961-63. In addition he wrote, produced or arranged hits by Adam Faith
Adam Faith
Terence "Terry" Nelhams-Wright, known as Adam Faith was a Teen idol English singer, actor and later financial journalist. He was one of the most charted acts of the 1960s. He became the first UK artist to lodge his initial seven hits in the Top 5...
, Petula Clark
Petula Clark
Petula Clark, CBE is an English singer, actress, and composer whose career has spanned seven decades.Clark's professional career began as an entertainer on BBC Radio during World War II...
, Anthony Newley
Anthony Newley
Anthony George Newley was an English actor, singer and songwriter. He enjoyed success as a performer in such diverse fields as rock and roll and stage and screen acting.-Early life:...
, Sammy Davis Jr and many others.
Keating arranged and conducted a series of albums for London's Phase 4 series, notable for its use of synthesiser technology such as the Moog synthesizer
Moog synthesizer
Moog synthesizer may refer to any number of analog synthesizers designed by Dr. Robert Moog or manufactured by Moog Music, and is commonly used as a generic term for older-generation analog music synthesizers. The Moog company pioneered the commercial manufacture of modular voltage-controlled...
and the EMS VCS 3
EMS VCS 3
The VCS 3 is a portable analog synthesiser with a flexible semi-modular voice architecture, by Electronic Music Studios Limited in 1969....
. The records were often used as demonstration discs in the 1970s in Hi-Fi stores because of their quality. Much of his work was rereleased following the Lounge music
Lounge music
Lounge music is a retrospective description of music popular in the 1950s and 1960s. It is a type of mood music meant to evoke in the listeners the feeling of being in a place — a jungle, an island paradise, outer space, et cetera — other than where they are listening to it...
revival of the mid 1990s and its use as breakbeats.
His song "Bunny Hop" is featured in the 1994 Tim Burton
Tim Burton
Timothy William "Tim" Burton is an American film director, film producer, writer and artist. He is famous for dark, quirky-themed movies such as Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Ed Wood, Sleepy Hollow, Corpse Bride and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet...
film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, Ed Wood
Ed Wood (film)
Ed Wood is a 1994 American comedy-drama biopic directed and produced by Tim Burton, and starring Johnny Depp as cult filmmaker Edward D. Wood, Jr. The film concerns the period in Wood's life when he made his best-known films as well as his relationship with actor Bela Lugosi, played by Martin Landau...
.
His "Theme from Z-Cars
Theme from Z-Cars
Theme from Z-Cars was the theme tune to the long running BBC television drama Z-Cars.Based on the traditional folk song Johnny Todd, which was in a collection of traditional tunes by Frank Kidson dated 1891 called Traditional Tunes: A Collection of Ballad Airs...
", a #5 hit
Hit single
A hit single is a recorded song or instrumental released as a single that has become very popular. Although it is sometimes used to describe any widely-played or big-selling song, the term "hit" is usually reserved for a single that has appeared in an official music chart through repeated radio...
in the UK Singles Chart
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
, was adopted by Everton
Everton F.C.
Everton Football Club are an English professional association football club from the city of Liverpool. The club competes in the Premier League, the highest level of English football...
as their theme song
Theme music
Theme music is a piece that is often written specifically for a radio program, television program, video game or movie, and usually played during the title sequence and/or end credits...
and remains so to this day.
As founder and principal of the Johnny Keating School of Music, Edinburgh, he has been directly responsible for the musical education of many students who later became successful professionals.
In 1999, he completed a four–volume academic reference book dedicated to the art of professional songwriting: Principles of Songwriting: A Study in Structure and Technique.
Album discography
- English Jazz - 1956 - BallyBally RecordsBally Records was a small record label located at 203 N. Wabash Ave. in Chicago, Illinois. Proper name was Bally Recording Corporation and it was a subsidiary of the pinball and slot machine manufacturer of the same name. The parent Company saw and filled a need to supply records to the coin...
- Swinging Scots - 1957 - DotDot RecordsDot Records was an American record label and company that was active between 1950 and 1977. It was founded by Randy Wood. In Gallatin, Tennessee, Wood had earlier started a mail order record shop, known for its radio ads on WLAC in Nashville and its R&B air personality Bill "Hoss" Allen...
- Percussive Moods SP44005 - 1963 - DeccaDecca RecordsDecca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
- Temptation SP44019 - 19?? - DeccaDecca RecordsDecca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
- Swing Revisited SP44034 - 1963 - DeccaDecca RecordsDecca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
- Johnny Keating and 27 Men-The Keating Sound SP44058 - 1966 DeccaDecca RecordsDecca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
- Keating...Straight Ahead SP44072 - 1966 - DeccaDecca RecordsDecca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
- This Bird Has Flown WS1638 - 1966 - Warner Bros. Records, Inc.
- Here's Where It Is WS1666 - 1966 - Warner Bros. Records, Inc.
- Space Experience CQ 32382 - 1972 - Columbia Records/CBS, Inc.
- John Keating Conducts the Electronic Philharmonic Orchestra - 1974 - EMIEMI RecordsEMI Records is the flagship record label founded by the EMI company in 1972 and launched in January 1973 as the successor to its Columbia label. The EMI label was launched worldwide...
- "Fanfare for the Common ManFanfare for the Common ManFanfare for the Common Man is a 20th-century American classical music work by American composer Aaron Copland. The piece was written in 1942 for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra under conductor Eugene Goossens. It was inspired in part by a famous speech made earlier in the same year where vice...
" - "Sabre DanceSabre Dance"The Sabre Dance" is a movement in the final act of the ballet Gayane , written by Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian's and completed in 1942. It evokes a whirling war dance in an Armenian dance, where the dancers display their skill with sabres. Its middle section incorporates an Armenian folk...
" - "Tristan und IsoldeTristan und IsoldeTristan und Isolde is an opera, or music drama, in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the romance by Gottfried von Straßburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered in Munich on 10 June 1865 with Hans von Bülow conducting...
: Prelude, Act III" - "LohengrinLohengrin (opera)Lohengrin is a romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850. The story of the eponymous character is taken from medieval German romance, notably the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and its sequel, Lohengrin, written by a different author, itself...
: Prelude, Act III" - "Hebridean Impressions" (written by Keating)
- John Keating Conducts the London Symphony Orchestra - 1972
- Space Experience, Vol. 1 & 2 - 1998 - EMI (Vol. 1 contains the LP Space Experience)
- Temptation & Percussive Moods - 2004 - VocalionVocalion RecordsVocalion Records is a record label active for many years in the United States and in the United Kingdom.-History:Vocalion was founded in 1916 by the Aeolian Piano Company of New York City, which introduced a retail line of phonographs at the same time. The name was derived from one of their...
- Swing Revisited - 2004 - Dutton Vocalion
- British Jazz - 2005 - Harkit
- British Jazz and Swinging Scots - 2008 - British Jazz
Songwriting credits
- "A Little Waltzin'"
- "Barber Shop Jump" - Ted Heath
- "Come Live With Me" - Carmen McRaeCarmen McRaeCarmen Mercedes McRae was an American jazz singer, composer, pianist, and actress. Considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th century, it was her behind-the-beat phrasing and her ironic interpretations of song lyrics that made her memorable...
- "Headin' North"
- "It's Not Going That Way" - Carmen McRae, Vic LewisVic LewisVic Lewis was a British jazz guitarist and bandleader.Lewis began playing the guitar at the age of three, and dabbled with cornet and trombone. One of his early bands included George Shearing, then a teenager, among its members...
- "On With the Don" - Ted Heath
- "Same Old Moon" - Percy FaithPercy FaithPercy Faith was a Canadian-born American bandleader, orchestrator, composer and conductor, known for his lush arrangements of pop and Christmas standards. He is often credited with creating the "easy listening" or "mood music" format which became staples of American popular music in the 1950s and...
- "Send for Henry" - Heinz Schonberger, Henry Main
- "The Clown"
- "Theme from "Hotel" - Nancy WilsonNancy Wilson (singer)Nancy Wilson is an American singer with more than 70 albums, and three Grammy Awards. She has been labeled a singer of blues, jazz, cabaret and pop; a "consummate actress"; and "the complete entertainer." The title she prefers, however, is song stylist...
- "This Hotel" - Percy Faith, Shirley HornShirley HornShirley Valerie Horn was an American jazz singer and pianist.-Biography:Encouraged by her grandmother, who was an amateur organist, Horn began piano lessons at the age of four. At twelve, Horn studied piano and composition at Howard University and later majored from there in classical music...
, Stan KentonStan KentonStanley Newcomb "Stan" Kenton was a pianist, composer, and arranger who led a highly innovative, influential, and often controversial American jazz orchestra. In later years he was widely active as an educator....
External links
- Keating's official Myspace page
- jazzprofessional.com profile by Ron Simmonds
- [ Allmusic.com biography] by Eugene Chadbourne
- John Keatings Official Site by Martin Keating