"Keith Emerson lived in the shadow of a great young keyboard player - and that player was him."

Marc Bonilla, reminiscing about Keith (paraphrased).

I had the pleasure of corresponding (infrequently via email) with Keith for about 10 years prior to his passing. Whenever I raised the subject of this transcription he always politely suggested "nobody would be interested in that" and changed the subject. I never pushed the point but I suspected he simply meant that the Gulda part at the beginning would cause all sorts of Copyright issues with publishing it. But I also sensed that there was something else - something very personal about this and his other creative output from the Brain Salad Surgery period. I could never quite put my finger on it until Marc Bonilla mentioned it (as paraphrased above). It was as if this performance marked a watershed moment in his career - a tour de force that raised the bar so high not just for the rest of us aspiring keyboardists but for Emo himself. To me, this makes his passing and the circumstances surrounding it all the more tragic and heart breaking.

Anyway, this is a transcription of the Piano Improvisations from the Cal Jam concert - the video of the original is also widely available both on an official ELP DVD and CD release as well as youtube. Enjoy!

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