85 Facts About Keith Emerson

Keith Noel Emerson was an English keyboardist, songwriter, composer and record producer.

Keith Emerson played keyboards in a number of bands before finding his first commercial success with the Nice in the late 1960s.

Keith Emerson became internationally famous for his work with the Nice, which included writing rock arrangements of classical music.

Keith Emerson wrote and arranged much of ELP's music on albums such as Tarkus and Brain Salad Surgery, combining his own original compositions with classical or traditional pieces adapted into a rock format.

Keith Emerson reunited The Nice in 2002 and 2003 for a tour.

Keith Emerson reunited with ELP bandmate Greg Lake in 2010 for a duo tour, culminating in a one-off ELP reunion show in London to celebrate the band's 40th anniversary.

Keith Emerson died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound on 11 March 2016 at his home in Santa Monica, California.

Keith Emerson is widely regarded as one of the greatest keyboard players of the progressive rock era.

Keith Emerson was born on 2 November 1944 in Todmorden, West Riding of Yorkshire.

Keith Emerson attended West Tarring School in Tarring.

Keith Emerson's mother Dorothy was not musical, but his father Noel was an amateur pianist and taught Emerson basic piano.

When Keith Emerson was eight, his parents arranged formal tuition, learning to play and read music with "local little old ladies" until he was around thirteen, with whom he studied to ABRSM Grade 7.

Keith Emerson's teacher put him in competitions at the Worthing Music Festival and suggested he finish studying music in London, but Keith Emerson had little interest in classical music at the time and chose jazz piano.

Keith Emerson used jazz sheet music from Dave Brubeck and George Shearing and learned about jazz piano from books and Andre Previn's version of My Fair Lady.

Keith Emerson listened to boogie-woogie, and to country-style pianists including Joe "Mr Piano" Henderson, Russ Conway and Winifred Atwell.

Keith Emerson became interested in the Hammond organ after hearing jazz organist Jack McDuff perform "Rock Candy", and the Hammond became his instrument of choice in the late 1960s.

Keith Emerson acquired his first Hammond organ, an L-100 model, at the age of 15 or 16, on hire purchase and a loan from his father.

Keith Emerson had saved money to buy a Bird electric organ with built-in speakers on each side, but then spotted a Hammond in the shop and thought it was a better purchase.

Keith Emerson played in a local 20-piece swing band run by Worthing Council, performing Count Basie and Duke Ellington tunes.

Keith Emerson's show with The Nice has been cited as having a strong influence on heavy metal musicians.

Away from The Nice, Keith Emerson was involved in the 1969 Music from Free Creek "supersession" project that included Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck.

Keith Emerson first heard a Moog synthesizer when a record shop owner played him Switched-On Bach by Wendy Carlos, and thought the instrument looked like "an electronic skiffle".

Vickers helped patch the Moog, and the concert saw Keith Emerson perform "Also sprach Zarathustra" by Richard Strauss with Vickers behind the machine to swap patches.

ELP's record deal provided funds for Keith Emerson to buy his own Moog modular synthesiser from the US, which was a preset model that had fewer leads and punch cards to call up certain patches.

Keith Emerson used the patch that Vickers provided, which contained six distinctive Moog sounds and became the foundation of ELP's sound.

Keith Emerson was the first artist to tour with a Moog synthesiser.

Occasionally Keith Emerson quoted from classical and jazz works without giving credit, particularly early in his career.

Keith Emerson indicated in an interview that he based his version of Pictures at an Exhibition on Mussorgsky's original piano composition, rather than on Maurice Ravel's later orchestration of the work.

Keith Emerson's concerto has since been performed by classical pianists, most notably Jeffrey Biegel, who has performed it several times and recorded it with Keith Emerson's permission.

Keith Emerson cited guitarist Jimi Hendrix and organist Don Shinn as his chief theatrical influences.

Keith Emerson engaged in knife throwing using a target fastened in front of his Leslie speakers.

Keith Emerson was given his trademark knife, an authentic Nazi dagger, by Lemmy Kilmister, who was a roadie for The Nice in his earlier days.

Keith Emerson toned down his theatrics with the organ when ELP used more stage props for their shows.

Keith Emerson was introduced to Bob McCarthy, former circus employee on Long Island, New York who demonstrated the stunt piano for him at his home.

Keith Emerson wished to use it at the band's reunion concert in 2010, but was forbidden by the local authority who said that the plans did not meet health and safety standards.

Keith Emerson was given the script for Chariots of Fire, but turned down the offer to score it.

Keith Emerson was the composer for the short-lived 1994 US animated television series Iron Man.

Keith Emerson toured briefly in 1990 with The Best, a supergroup including John Entwistle of The Who, Joe Walsh of the Eagles, Jeff "Skunk" Baxter of Steely Dan and The Doobie Brothers, and Simon Phillips.

The group's name came from the application process for a US work visa, and the members included several British musicians who, like Keith Emerson, had come to Los Angeles to further their careers.

Keith Emerson participated in The Nice's reunion tour and a 40th anniversary show for ELP, preceded by a short duo tour with Greg Lake.

Keith Emerson continued his solo and soundtrack work into the 2000s.

Keith Emerson was one of three composers who contributed to the soundtrack for the Japanese kaiju film Godzilla: Final Wars.

Japanese composer Takashi Yoshimatsu worked with Keith Emerson to create an arrangement of ELP's song "Tarkus", which premiered on 14 March 2010, performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra.

In September 2011, Emerson began working with Norwegian conductor Terje Mikkelsen, along with the Keith Emerson Band featuring Marc Bonilla and the Munich Radio Orchestra, on new orchestral renditions of ELP classics and their new compositions.

Keith Emerson made his conducting debut with Orchestra Kentucky of Bowling Green, Kentucky in September 2013.

In October 2014, Keith Emerson conducted the South Shore Symphony at his 70th birthday tribute concert at Molloy College in Rockville Centre, New York.

In 2000, Keith Emerson was a featured panelist and performer at "The Keyboard Meets Modern Technology", an event honouring Moog presented by the Smithsonian in Washington, DC, in conjunction with a gallery exhibition celebrating the 300th anniversary of the piano.

Keith Emerson made a guest appearance in 2009 on Spinal Tap's album Back from the Dead, and played on several songs at Spinal Tap's "One Night Only World Tour" at Wembley Arena on 30 June 2009.

In 2004 Keith Emerson published his autobiography entitled Pictures of an Exhibitionist, which dealt with his life up to his nearly career-ending nerve-graft surgery in 1993.

In 2007, Keith Emerson began working with Canadian independent filmmaker Jason Woodford to make a documentary film based on his autobiography.

Around the Christmas of 1969, Keith Emerson married his Danish girlfriend Elinor Lund.

Keith Emerson enjoyed flying as a hobby, and he obtained his pilot's licence in 1972.

In 2002, Keith Emerson was in the process of returning to live in England.

In 1993, Keith Emerson was forced to take a year off from playing after he developed a nerve-related condition affecting his right hand that he likened to "writer's cramp", and that was reported as a form of arthritis.

Keith Emerson turned to alcohol, before a course of psychotherapy led to his move to Santa Monica.

In 2002, Keith Emerson had regained the full use of his hands and could play to his usual strength.

In September 2010, Keith Emerson underwent immediate surgery after a routine colonoscopy had revealed a "rather dangerous" polyp in his lower colon.

Keith Emerson died on 11 March 2016 in Santa Monica, California, of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

Keith Emerson's body was found at his Santa Monica home.

Keith Emerson was buried on 1 April 2016 at Lancing and Sompting Cemetery, Lancing, West Sussex.

Keith Emerson sometimes reached into the interior of his piano and hit, plucked, or strummed the strings with his hand.

Keith Emerson said that as a keyboard player, he hated the idea of being "static" and that to avoid it, he "wanted to get inside the piano, brush the strings, stick Ping-Pong balls inside".

Keith Emerson is recognized for having integrated different sounds into his writing, utilizing methods of both horizontal and vertical contrast.

Vertical contrast is the combination of multiple styles simultaneously; Keith Emerson frequently played a given style with one hand and a contrasting one with the other.

Keith Emerson used dissonance, atonality, sonata and fugue forms, exposing rock and roll audiences to myriad classical styles from Bach to Stravinsky.

Keith Emerson used a variety of electronic keyboard instruments during his career, including several Hammond organs and synthesisers by Moog Music, Yamaha, and Korg.

Keith Emerson preferred the sound of the C-3 as being "far superior" to the cheaper L-100, and used the L-100 to "throw around and make it feed back".

Keith Emerson got the L-100 to feed back by placing it close to the onstage speakers and using a fuzzbox.

Keith Emerson continued to perform physical abuse stunts with the L-100 to some degree throughout his years with ELP.

Keith Emerson owned several other Hammond organ models in addition to the L-100s and the C-3.

When Keith Emerson sold much of his gear in the mid-1990s, his Hammond organs were among the items he kept as being "too personal to let go".

The ribbon controller allowed Keith Emerson to vary pitch, volume or timbre of the output from the Moog by moving his finger up and down the length of a touch-sensitive strip.

Keith Emerson continued to divide his keyboard setup into two banks so that he could play between them with his body in view.

Keith Emerson used a prototype polyphonic synthesiser produced by Moog, which was the test bed for the Moog Polymoog polyphonic synthesiser.

Occasionally Keith Emerson used a pipe organ, when available, in live performances and on recordings.

Keith Emerson played the Royal Albert Hall Organ at a show with The Nice on 26 June 1968, where the band controversially burned a painting of an American flag onstage to protest against the Vietnam War.

Keith Emerson played this organ again in 2002 to open The Nice reunion tour show, but according to a reviewer, the organ failed to operate at the expected volume.

Keith Emerson was recorded playing the organ at St Mark's Church in London for "The Only Way " on the 1971 ELP album Tarkus.

Keith Emerson became one of the few buyers of the Yamaha GX-1 polyphonic synthesiser, which reportedly cost almost $50,000.

Keith Emerson later bought a second GX-1 from John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin, and used parts from it to repair his original GX-1, which was damaged by a tractor crashing into Keith Emerson's home studio.

Keith Emerson sold much of his keyboard equipment in the 1990s when he relocated from England to Santa Monica, California.

Keith Emerson became an official endorser for the PS-3300 and PS-3100 in the early 1980s.

In March 2010 Keith Emerson received the annual Frankfurt Music Prize for his achievements, awarded in Frankfurt on the eve of the annual Musikmesse fair.

In 2014 Keith Emerson was inducted into the Hammond Hall of Fame by the Hammond Organ Company.

Keith Emerson occasionally covered or sampled other musical works in his compositions.