PrivateCollectionFrontIntroduction

“Private Collection” is the third album by the musical partnership of Jon Anderson and Vangelis, after their earlier albums “Short Stories”(1980) and “The Friends Of Mr. Cairo” (1981).

Released in May 1983, the album is a collection of 6 songs produced in the same way as their previous albums, a method of spontaneous sessions where both musicians improvise music and lyrics, which were then later dubbed with Jon’s finalised lyrics and (if required) music overdubs. Possibly the release of the Private Collection-album was delayed due to Vangelis’ busy work schedule at the time, working on the film scores for Chariots Of Fire (1981), Missing (1982) and Blade Runner (1982). In an interview published in July 1982 Vangelis said that the music for the 3rd Jon and Vangelis-album had already been recorded.

The music on this album is easily the most romantic and accessible by the duo, a combination of lush synhesizers and percussion by Vangelis and Jon’s angelic voice. Almost every song on the album made it on a single release one way or another, except for ‘Italian Song’ (with its made-up Italian-sounding fantasy lyrics) and the long and epic ‘Horizon’, with almost 23 minutes in length taking up the entire backside of the LP. Several singles contain the non-album track ‘Song Is’, a beautiful 6-minute track which for a long time was only available on vinyl records. Fortunately ‘Song Is’ was included as a bonus track on the “Delectus” CD boxset in 2017.

Completists may be interested to know that the UK promo single of ‘And When The Night Comes’ (JVDJ3, silver label only!) includes a demo version of the song in an early, different arrangement. Note that the record is kind of a misprint, as at 45 RPM the music plays too slow, making it necessary to speed up the recording to hear the correct version.

That same year Private Collection received a re-release which was personally remastered by Vangelis. If looking for a copy of the album this version is recommended for its excellent sound quality. Note that ‘Song Is’ is not included on this remaster, as of yet the track remains exclusive to the “Delectus” boxset.

 

PrivateCollectionCDTracklist and credits

  1. Italian Song
  2. And When The Night Comes*
  3. Deborah
  4. Polonaise
  5. He Is Sailing
  6. Horizon

* saxophone by Dick Morrissey.

  • Music composed by Vangelis.
  • Lyrics by Jon Anderson.
  • Arranged, produced and performed by Vangelis.
  • Engineered by Raine Shine and Jerome van de Krugt
  • Special thanks to Musicland, Paris, for providing synthesizers and to Francis Martian and Frederic Rousseau.
  • Sleeve and photography by Vangelis, Alwyn Clayden, Green Ink and Tony Latham.
  • Thanks to Jon Martin.

 

AndWhenTheNightComesFrontDiscography

CD

  • 1983 Polydor, released worldwide.
  • 1987 Polydor P33P 25030 Japan
  • 1992 Polydor POCP-2113 Japan
  • 2004 Polydor UICY-9377 Japan (Limited edition papersleeve)
  • 2017 UMC 478 941-1 UK & Europe (Remastered by Vangelis)

LP

  • 1983 Polydor, released worldwide.

 

DeborahFront7” single

  • 1983 And When The Night Comes / Song Is (Polydor 813 106-7) Germany, The Netherlands, Italy and Portugal.
  • 1983 And When The Night Comes / Song Is (Polydor 813 297-7) France
  • 1983 And When The Night Comes / Song Is (Polydor JV3) UK
  • 1983 And When The Night Comes / Song Is (Polydor JVDJ3) UK (promotional, with either red label/PS, or silver label/plain sleeve)
  • 1983 And When The Night Comes / Polonaise (Polydor PDS 2230) Canada
  • 1983 Deborah / Song Is (Polydor 813 837-7) Spain
  • 1983 Deborah / And When The Night Comes (Polydor 81552427) Brazil
  • 1983 He Is Sailing / Polonaise (Polydor 815 097-7) Germany, The Netherlands and Spain.
  • 1983 He Is Sailing / Polonaise (Polydor JV4) UK and Ireland.
  • 1983 Polonaise / Song Is (Polydor 813 884-7) France

12” maxi single

  • 1983 He Is Sailing (full length version)/ Song Is (Polydor JVX4) United Kingdom

 

Recording studio

The music of Private Collection was recorded in an unnamed studio in Paris and Nemo Studios in London. At the time Vangelis’ engineer in London was Raine Shine, and on the album a Jerome van de Krugt (real name Jeroen van de Krugt) is also credited for engineering. In the early 1980s Jeroen was a sound engineer in Studio Des Dames in Paris.

 

BestOfJonAndVangelisInsideMore

  • In 1980 Jon and Vangelis released their first album "Short Stories".
  • In 1981 Jon and Vangelis released their second album "The Friends Of Mr. Cairo".
  • To market the success of Jon and Vangelis, Polydor released a Best Of Jon and Vangelis-album in July 1984, together with "State Of Independence" as a single release.
  • Vangelis contributed to Jon Anderson's 1985 album "3 Ships", composing the song "Easier Said Than Done".
  • In 1986 Jon and Vangelis recorded a few demo sessions which never resulted in a new album. The songs have appeared however on several bootlegs. Some of these songs were later covered by Jon's group Yes.
  • In 1986 Jon Anderson performed live on stage with Vangelis in Los Angeles at the UCLA University.
  • In 1991 Jon and Vangelis released their fourth and final album "Page Of Life".

 

Links

PrivateCollectionInside