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Rick Wakeman, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame keyboardist from Yes, played a very entertaining show at a nearly sold-out Kent Stage. 

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In what he is calling "The Final Solo Tour," the seventy-five year old is still masterful behind the keyboard and quick with a joke.  He admitted that a hernia surgery from earlier this year may have slowed him down going between his keyboards and grand piano that were on stage.  However, his dexterity and prowess on the ivories was never in question.

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Wakeman, not wearing his usual cape, started the show by played two pieces from The Six Wives of Henry VIII, "Katherine Howard" and "Jane Seymour" on keys and synth.

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He then made his way over to the grand piano and began telling stories of all the various people that he has worked with early in his career like Elton John, Frank Zappa and Jon Anderson. Noting that Zappa seemed to be on a more distant planet even from Jon Anderson.  He remarked that his favorite artist he ever worked with was David Bowie and he was thrilled to be a part of two of his earliest hits.  He then went into two mesmerizing covers of "Space Oddity" and "Life on Mars?"

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Making his way back to the keyboards, Wakeman spoke about going down to southwestern England where a town claimed that their local castle was home to King Arthur.  Turns out that castle was built a few hundred years after Arthur but they recently have done some excavating and they found the remains of another castle that may have been built during Arthur's so they may not have been wrong after all.

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With that he went into "King Arthur Theme", "Guinvere," "The Last Battle" and "Merlin The Magician."

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Going back to the piano, Wakeman noted that he has a new album called Yessonata.  It is a collection of over thirty pieces of songs that he helped create when he was in the band Yes.  He said every concert that this song is played is "different but the same," because he doesn't play every piece exactly the same every night.   He then went into a sixteen minute opus of "Yessonata." 

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Rounding out the main set were two songs that Wakeman said "I wish I had written" which included the John Lennon penned "Help!" and the McCartney tune "Eleanor Rigby."

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Coming back to the stage quipping "I don't know why I leave, you know I'm just standing off to the side" to encore with a piece that he said would be played the way it was originally written, which was just on the piano.  Some excerpts from "The Journey to the Centre of the Earth" closed out a fantastic show of exceptional musicianship.

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Review and photos by Greg Drugan

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