Procol Harum

Beyond
the Pale

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Procol Harum head for the Dominion Theatre, London

Geoff Dunn, drummer and photographer, documents the rehearsal-room run-up (1)




The ghostlike desolation of the rehearsal complex where the Procols prepared the Dominion show is mitigated by this fabulous sky

It's the morning of Thursday 20 November. Wednesday was theoretically a day off for Procol, but – Geoff Whitehorn having been hospitalised – a lot of it must have been spent recruiting and
preparing his stand-in, Dave Colquhoun (that's his head above the cymbal). Matt Pegg, with his bass, has been schooling Dave through Homburg and Simple Sister. The BtP ambassador has just
delivered to Gary Brooker the large champagne bottle he was given in Freising on his 69th birthday, and which has now been converted, by West-Country artisans, into a table lamp. The neat wooden
box
in which it travelled safely back from Germany may be seen in the bottom left of this picture, in front of  the Commander's piano's flight-case

Gary Brooker at his keyboard, and Dave Colquhoun's keyboard allows him to make notes on the songs as the band works through them. On the wall behind
GB's head, the set list he has inherited from Geoff Whitehorn and which (as the detail below shows) he learnt – and performed – with no changes

One can just about recognise the song titles written on the board, and correlate them
with the running-order from The Dominion, shewn to the left of this enlargement

A similar shot, but with more colour and more Les Paul in it. You can see the characteristic wing-shape
of the faux grand, propped up in the background in some of these shots

A somewhat worried-looking organist. 'It's the luck of the Procols,' said Josh about Maestro Whitehorn's incapacity, 'But you know us, Roland, we're never been beaten yet!'
And they weren't. In fact, the emergency line-up worked two days here, then had their scheduled day-off on Saturday, before resuming work, with orchestra and choir, on Sunday
 


Procol dates in 2014 | Procol Harum dates with orchestra | More pictures: what happened next

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