{"product_id":"various-when-the-day-is-done-the-orchestrations-of-robert-kirby","title":"Various - When The Day Is Done: The Orchestrations Of Robert Kirby","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eA college friend of Nick Drake, Robert Kirby’s first commissioned works as an arranger were his unique, autumnal orchestrations for Drake’s “Five Leaves Left”. The sound was English and melancholic, closer to Vaughan Williams than Phil Spector. He was soon in demand and by the end of the 70s had worked with the cream of the British folk rock world. This is the first collection of Kirby’s very special sound.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNick Drake’s first two albums – “Five Leaves Left” and “Bryter Layter” – sold in tiny numbers when they were first released at the turn of the 70s. Their re-evaluation in the decades since, and the ever-increasing number of Drake fans around the world, has a lot to do with Robert Kirby, whose string, brass and woodwind arrangements helped to make the records so distinctive. They were totemic of a post-60s, post-swinging England that wore a greatcoat and kicked up leaves: the misted, melancholic sweep of ‘Hazey Jane II’; the bedsit-life-in-miniature feel to ‘Day Is Done’; the gentle urban hug of ‘At The Chime Of A City Clock’. Kirby’s orchestrations were relaxed, familiar and entirely autumnal. They matched the photo of Drake on the rear of “Five Leaves Left”, leaning against a wall as everyone else sped past, busy doing nothing. They also matched his smoky, Colin Blunstone-like tones, comfortable with their mock Tudor, middle-class Englishness. The records may have sold poorly, but Kirby’s talent was quickly appreciated by producers Joe Boyd and Sandy Roberton, who booked him to work with other prime British underground folk-rockers including Ian Matthews, Vashti Bunyan, Spirogyra, Shelagh McDonald and Steeleye Span. He would be in demand on the folk rock scene right up to its fall from grace at the end of the 70s - working with nearly everyone in the canon incluing: Steve Ashley, Shirley Collins, Ralph McTell, Sandy Denny and Richard and Linda Thompson.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"ACE RECORDS","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":53022531060054,"sku":"MRM-03810","price":15.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1000\/6088\/9430\/files\/Robert-Kirby_1200_1200.png?v=1784822747","url":"https:\/\/monorailmusic.com\/products\/various-when-the-day-is-done-the-orchestrations-of-robert-kirby","provider":"Monorail Music","version":"1.0","type":"link"}