Shine On-line

The Case of the Uncredited Pig Sounds: Richard Amey

High summer! A day when it was simply just good to be alive. I had no appointments so it seemed the natural thing to do, to stroll around to visit and indulge in a chat with my good friend.

Hardly a conversation I had ever had with him had failed to produce something of fascinating, not to say irregular interest, and something such as that would be an ideal way to pass an hour or so of this most pleasant sunlit July morning.

Mrs Hudson answered the door and once it was closed behind me, I sensed immediately that this was a visit in which my sudden presence in his room would involve transporting him reluctantly back to the more mundane world of the present. In other words, I would be interrupting his violin playing.

My equable mood told me not to upset too dramatically the atmosphere I knew that I would be stepping into. He played the violin for therapeutic reasons, among others, and as a doctor, who was I on this singular morning to deprive one of the world’s great minds of some vital relaxation and diversion?

Having told Mrs Hudson of my intention, I instead waited outside the door to listen and pick a suitable moment to make my entry.

From inside came the familiar sounds – it even sounded like he was playing the National Anthem. Surely this was either my good friend at his most patriotic, or his most jocular!

After a moment I could contain no longer my desire to ascertain which.

'Good day, Holmes. I had no idea July 20 was a royal birthday. To whom is your music dedicated this fine morning?'

Evidently, he was not disposed to let me interrupt him so abruptly, and played on a little before pausing and turning towards me, the instrument still tucked under his chin.

'Ah, Watson. It had you foxed, didn’t it – by the way, Good Morning!' said Holmes. 'There is no such birthday, today, as you well know. What you find me playing this morning is a very different kind of anthem. Do you mean to tell me you don’t recognise the melody?'

'Now come on, Holmes,' I chuckled in reply. 'You know that my knowledge of music takes not even a poor second place to that of the medical matters, from which I was hoping to detach myself a little more decisively at this moment! I regret you’ll have to tell me.'

'With the music you have been hearing, Watson, we are no longer in the world of obsequious salutation to an august monarch. In requesting its identity, you have invited yourself into a far more elevated world, far beyond these normal things.'

He re-tucked the edge of the noble instrument under his chin, cocked his right wrist and resumed playing. Certainly there was a nobility, even though there was a just single line that he was playing. Somehow, I sensed, what I heard was only a fragment of something far bigger in sound. At length, Holmes tailed off and drew a deep breath that subtly kept contained from wider hearing a slight sigh.

'Are you not acquainted with Procol Harum, my dear Watson?'

There was a pause, an awkward one on my part. Holmes’s mouth moved slowly into an enigmatic, quizzical grin. I desperately racked through my memory for something I knew was far too deep down for instant recollection.

'Surely you remember that piece that made them a household name – all too briefly, though, for you it seems ...'

'I fear so, Holmes. You’ll have to tell me.'

'The Miller’s Tale, Watson: not Chaucer, but I give you this as a teasing reference. What about skipping the Light ...'
'Fandango!' I succeeded in interrupting. 'What came next?

'Turned cartwheels 'cross the floor, Watson. Are you getting there? I think you might be. What about the vestal virgins?'

'Why, of course,' I cried. 'I remember little more after that, though, Holmes, because my good wife then used to reach for the off switch on the transistor radio. "That’s quite enough of that," she used to exclaim.'

'Indeed, alas,' mused Holmes, temporarily coaxed from the inner world in which I had found him. 'You should really have tried to do more about Mrs Watson’s reluctance to confront the world’s more carnal realities.'

Momentarily I was shocked. What was this Holmes had recommended? From a man more upright and composed than I had thought allowed him to contemplate even the timorous beginnings of an excursion into the more physical interactions of which men and women are intimately capable.

'Come on, Watson,' Holmes next uttered, back in a more serious mode, returning to the original task in hand. 'Surely you haven’t forgotten the title?'

I could manage no more than silence.

He suddenly looked exasperated.

'We are, after all, Watson, talking about one of the great lyrical mysteries – dare I suggest insolvable mysteries – of our very century, are we not?'

He left the air pregnant for a reply. I could manage none.

'A Whiter Shade ...'

'... of Pale,' I finished, too utterly ashamed of myself to issue the remaining words in any kind of triumph.

'This, Watson, is a world worth exploring. Except so few people chose that turning. So few people knew where the turning was. Let us just say that I was among the lucky ones. And our good friend Inspector Lestrade was not, needless to say.'

He pointed to the table. On it was a square picture, black, with a white image I could not decipher from the distance at which I had taken stance.

Holmes gently revolved the picture in my direction.

I looked at the picture. A tree with leaves, depicted as though a lino cutting with in front a figure, which I could tell was female because of the pout and the flowing white full-length gown, plus some woodland foliage and blooms at ground level. I wanted to remark that the figure, shown sideways on, with no definite arms, made me think of something like a cross between an ostrich and Masai woman with her neck rings all removed.

Holmes’s demeanour told me to risk no such thing.

'One of the sixteen vestal virgins, I assume!' I offered, this time in absolute triumph at having made a genuine contribution to the conversation for the first time.

'You’re probably right, Watson. But the key to the art of Procol Harum is often to keep your mind open to several other possible interpretations. This girl probably wandered in through the garden fence into the scene in which we now find her. She may even be called Mabel, though that might stretch credibility too far.

'The garden may lie outside the Gates of Cerdes and the scene could be interpreted to be redolent of salad days because I can see no snow.

'But I jest, Watson, and merely toy with a few song titles. This is Procol Harum’s first LP. I have all the others, but I'm not expecting you to know any of the titles. Suffice it for your brief education, now, for me to return to what I was doing and offer you both an explanation and an item of intrigue.'

Naturally, I thought. That is the ingredient that has so captivated Holmes with this Procol Harum. This was all a revelation for which I had come completely unprepared. As Holmes resumed playing, I looked out of the window, then looked back sharply into the room because the sun was streaming blindingly in. I surrendered myself to Holmes’s new whim and made myself comfortable in a chair.

'Well then, Holmes, what is that you are playing. I think I can safely say it’s definitely not A Whiter Shade of Pale.'

'It is the first violin part to an instrumental gathering-together, after a period of psychological trauma. It is called Grand Finale. It completes a suite of songs called In Held 'Twas In I.'

'Why is it merely the first violin part?' I queried.

'Because, dear Watson, more than twenty years ago I had the chance to fulfil an ambition. I was younger, of course, and my playing was better then. I had a friend in the London orchestral world who made it possible for me to join the rear desks of an orchestra who were playing with this very Procol Harum at a now-deceased venue known as the Rainbow Theatre in Finsbury Park.

'I was able to join in the music, in the spirit in which it was made, Watson. Fortunately, my skills meant I was able to play my parts without displeasing the conductor, a certain Mr Guy Woolfenden, and I enjoyed one of the most rewarding evenings of my life.'

'Most interesting, Holmes,' I inserted. 'And did you get to play with Mr Woolfenden again?'
'No. That was the least of my aims, Watson. Unless Mr Woolfenden happened to be conducting another such collaboration, he was to play no further part in my making fantasy a reality. I mentioned the Rainbow concert because Finsbury Park is part of your experience. I am quite sure you have visited the district. No, my involvement goes back further than that.

'Again, it had been sheer opportunism. I was in Canada when it was announced that Procol Harum would be playing and recording a concert in Edmonton. I was in Vancouver but heard about rehearsals and another friend got me on the depping list. Someone in the second-last desk of first violins became suddenly ill and I could not believe my good fortune. Mind you, the orchestra were all towing the militant line of the Musicians Union and I could see their strict observance of working hours was putting Mr Brooker under some duress. But there was nothing I could do about that, I’m afraid.

'In my bedroom, I have the evidence.'

Holmes brought through a second LP cover, in a stiff PVC preservative sleeve. Live In Concert With the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. With a boyish perkiness I had never before seen in Holmes, he pointed to a violinist caricatured on the front artwork which depicted the whole orchestra, choir and group.

' I reckon that’s me, Watson,' he said, triumphant in his own turn.

In an instant, I could see he was correct. Proportionally, the sketch did him perfect justice.

'Good gracious, Holmes.' I gasped in surprise.

'Part of history, Watson,' he replied. 'This record rescued the group from possible oblivion. After that, I was included in the recording sessions for their greatest masterwork.'

He immediately took up the violin again. Out from under his fingers ascended one resolute upward scale, then another, then a held note, sustained passionately by the player, who began to hum with a great ardour.

'The preparation for Mick Grabham’s guitar break in Grand Hotel, Watson,' he exclaimed, still playing roughly time as he said it. 'One of the great moments in the Procol Harum genre. Not a note wasted, unable to be improved on.

'Though last night I watched Mr Grabham try ...'

Holmes put the violin down, hesitantly, as he spoke; reluctantly, I was certain.

'Last night, Watson, I took the train down into Surrey. You remember the well-known family of the Roylotts, of Stoke Moran?

I nodded.

'But no, this has nothing to do with that case at all,' Holmes continued. 'I sense I might have reached the brink of boring you with my musical musings, Watson, but this might be more up your street.

'Journalists, as you know, can be of detective persuasion. They like their intrigues and their revelations. Procol Harum have a journal called Shine On and some while ago a Mr Richard Amey speculated on the identity of the person who provided the imitations of snorting pigs.'

'Really, Holmes,' I queried, leaning not forward in eager attentiveness, but rather backward in disbelief. For an instant, a look of slight awkward embarrassment flitted across Holmes’s features. 'Pigs?' I asked.

'There is a song called Piggy Piggy Pig, Watson ...' A second look of embarrassment appeared on his face, but this one was stifled and briefer.

'Vocal sound effects are added to the long fadeout and I am sure I detect the mating squirmings and reports of the Black Berkshire among them. They seem utterly authentic to any one other than a pig farmer.

'Really, Holmes,' I laughed, 'I had no idea you had any acquaintance with the works of Beatrix Potter.'

'Each to his own, Watson,' Holmes quickly smiled, amused but impatient at the slight tangent I had introduced to a point in the conversation at which he would be experiencing a gathering momentum of excitement.

'Mr Amey’s theory was that the band’s lyricist Keith Reid, not noted for any vocal talent, indeed conspicuous in his absence from any vocal credits whatsoever [sic] across the whole canon of Procol Harum, was the exponent of these remarkable noises.

'Indeed, Amey seems a man after my own heart. Someone evidently also mindful never to confuse the unlikely with the impossible.

'Fascinated, I had the chance to test his theory for myself by attending a special concert for Shine On readers celebrating 30 years since A Whiter Shade of Pale swept the world.

'Reid was expected to appear and, since Amey had expressed hope that Piggy Pig Pig would be performed, should Reid have, indeed, taken the stage and provided the pig sounds, then the mystery would have been solved at a stroke – unless they deliberately planted Reid in this performance to conceal the true man responsible – a ruse of which I would not dismiss the bandleader Mr Brooker from being capable.

'And I could have asked Mr Reid if his own knowledge of Beatrix Potter had prompted him to obey authenticity.'

'It sounds like an open and shut case, Holmes,' I commented. 'The very kind at the dénouement of which you’d expect to find Lestrade waiting in the wings, handcuffs at the ready!'

'Ah, but Reid wasn’t there, Watson ...'

Holmes paused, in that deliberate way of his.

'Guitarist and occasional vocalist Mick Grabham made nothing more than a token, barely audible effort at the pig noises himself. And it sounded nothing like the record. Besides, he wasn’t even in the band when they recorded it.'

'Excuses were made for Mr Reid’s disappointing absence at a celebration in honour of a work of art for which he must be held half responsible. His name is one half of the composing credits.

'But I was not convinced. Let me put it to you, Watson. In the light of our considerable past experiences together, from all the cases of crime that have entertained us, does that not resemble the behaviour of man with something to hide?'

We both chuckled.

'I have to confess, Holmes, he does sound very much like the man were are looking for.'

'My contacts tell me, Watson, that Mr Keith Reid can be found either in New York or London – depending upon which half of the year it happens to be. Do you remember that hotel we stayed at together in Manhattan? I think we should sent them a wire. Will your wife allow you to come with me?

'I tell, you Watson: when you have eliminated the impossible whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

'In the meantime, I fancy I will ask Mrs Hudson to serve up a leg of pork for dinner on Friday.

'Would you care to join me?'

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Shine On-Line May 1998