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Jon Anderson’s Open – 372

Produced by Jeffrey Crecelius, Wayne Hall, Preston Frazier, Bill Govier and VR Hoisington

Open by Jon Anderson from 2011

This week, Geoff Bailie pointed out to me another gaping hole in my knowledge of Yes and the surrounding music. It’s Jon Anderson’s EP or single, depending on your viewpoint, Open from 2011.

Listen and let us know what you think!

  • What was ‘Open’
  • How did I miss the release?
  • What’s the music like?

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TV Tropes Yes collection of trvia


Show notes and links

YMP Patrons:

Producers:

  • Jeffrey Crecelius
  • Preston Frazier
  • VR Hoisington
  • Bill Govier and
  • Wayne Hall

Patrons:

Aaron Steelman
Dave Owen
Mark James Lang
Paul Tomei
Joost Maglev
David Heyden
Martin Kjellberg
Paul Wilson
Bob Martilotta
Lind
Michael O’Connor
Peter Hearnden
Brian Sullivan
David Pannell
Miguel Falcão
Lobate Scarp
Chris Bandini
David Watkinson
Neal Kaforey
Rachel Hadaway
Craig Estenes
Dem
Paul Hailes
Mark ‘Zarkol’ Baggs
Doug Curran
Robert Nasir
Fergus Cubbage
Scott Colombo
Fred Barringer
Scott Smith
Geoff Bailie
Simon Barrow
Geoffrey Mason
Stephen Lambe
Guy R DeRome
Steve Dill
Henrik Antonsson
Steve Perry
Hogne Bø Pettersen
Steve Rode
IanNB
Steve Scott
Jamie McQuinn
Steven Roehr
Ken Fuller
Terence Sadler
Jeremy North
Tim Stannard
Jim
Todd Dudley
John Cowan
Tony Handley
John Holden
Joseph Cottrell
John Parry
Keith Hoisington
John Thomson
William Hayes

Robert and David

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Theme music

The music I use is the last movement of Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. This has been used as introduction music at many Yes concerts. My theme music is not take from a live concert – I put it together from the following two creative commons sources: thanvannispen and archive.org

7 replies on “Jon Anderson’s Open – 372”

Ive gotta say, it’s the first time I’ve heard it, and, wow. This is something I need in my life. So strong all the way through. eBay, here I come..

Ive gotta say, it’s the first time I’ve heard it, and, wow. This is something I need in my life. So strong all the way through. eBay, here I come..

What a gorgeous piece of music—and with all the classic Jon A themes! How did so many of us miss this? Thanks for bringing it to our attention .

Jon Anderson is an incredibly creative guy – I’m so impressed with his constant movement from project to project.
But Open was a big meh for me. It felt more like a demo to me, and I kept wondering what the song would be like if Jon had brought it to Yes. (So to that extent I agree with Kevin and Mark – in fact, I feel like the two of you almost talked yourselves back from loving the song by the end of your discussion with each other!)
Admittedly, I’m not a musician, and I probably lack the ability to appreciate what is going on in the song. Also, I’m not a big fan of Jon’s non-Yes work except for Olias and some of the work with Vangelis. Just to up the ante, I much prefer Heaven and Earth!

A quick amendment – having gone back and listened to Anderson/Stolt after posting, Open is as much a demo for that project as for anything with Yes. I’m not an enormous fan of A/S but there is some good stuff there and some excellent musicianship by all involved. (But maybe A/S is close to what Yes might have done with Jon as a follow up to Magnification?)

I remember searching a long time for this when it came out, eventually I found it on cassette. A trade from somewhere or another.

I think this could have been a good Yes track, as you both said, you can hear the parts just ready for the Yes guys to step in.

It shows Jon in a great light. The orchestra is terrific too and you can’t help but think this needs Yesising!

A really lovely creation and it has an Olias logo so how can it fail.

Totally agree. I bought this on iTunes on release (must have read about it in Prog?) and liked it but it didn’t go into my on-repeat pile of Yes related music. The orchestration is really good, the singing is excellent but it definitely lacks the Yes factor.

The orchestration is actually better than the composition which is unusual in rock music usually it is the orchestral arrangement that is a bit lacking (sometimes not much more than an orchestral pad doubling a synth part). It is a “lovely creation” for sure but neither quite fish nor fowl for me.

Close to essential though. Even if Magnification has a lot better songs on it.

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