Procol Harum

Beyond
the Pale

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Denny Cordell, Procol Harum producer

1 August 1943 (Buenos Aires, Argentina) – 18 February 1995

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Denny Cordell speaks about his contribution to A Whiter Shade of Pale, and about the state of the original demo, in a BBC Radio 4 programme from March 2002 that you can listen to here. 'I was trying to copy When a Man loves a Woman by Percy Sledge …'


Looks like a shot from a Sci-Fi 'B' movie An entirely personal estimation of Mr Cordell, sent to BtP in July 1999:

Denny Cordell, producer, guru, early Procol supporter and occasionally underhanded ne'er-do-well, sits [left] at the controls in a recording studio during the late 1960s.

Though debate still rages over the production values of his work, especially on the first Procol LP, there is a warmth and proximity that somehow coalesces that first edgy masterpiece into an approximation of a 32-track daydream.

I, for one, have always loved that first production, for it is the one where the grand master himself, Maff, is up front, unchained and glorified as on no other album to date.

As Paul Williams said ... "and I have derived no end of pleasure from imagining I was listening to it, as I walk down various streets." ... All those timeless moments ago, in the then, and in the very much now."

July 1999

Quite a lot of Cordell information in this feature
about
the death of his son, Tarka Cordell


Tony Visconti describes Cordell

More Procol personnel


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