Musical Roots - Elton John

In my sporadic blogging, I've had a tendency to pick fairly recent material to blog about.

That neatly elides the fact that many of my musical tastes were formed during the 80's and, in particular, the 90's. In the 80's, after having listened to all too many Beatles- and Rod Stewart-tapes, I had an extended period of awe of Elton Johns piano-playing - mainly since I started playing the piano myself during that age. The hit single "I Don't Wanna Go on with You Like That" from Reg Strikes Back, released in '88, was a firm favourite of mine during that period.


Yes. It is painful to watch now. And this is definitely not Elton John at his best. (Not only because he looks absolutely silly in that suit.)

Digging back into his back catalogue, I remember his come-back single from '83, "I'm Still Standing", being high on my hit list, as well. That actually holds up quite a lot better. It's more upbeat and even though there's a driving 4/4 beat it is rhythmically more interesting because of the extra little syncopated tap between the 4 and the 1 beat - seemingly giving the tempo an extra little kick every time.



These days, I tend to favour Bennie And The Jets as my favourite Elton John song. Here is a delightful little act  from The Muppet Show with a snippet of Bennie And The Jets. Elton's voice is crisp and strong here. And he actually plays a nice piano with a good wooden sound, instead of those with a more 'electric' feel (for lack of a better word) that he tended to favour most of the time. According to The Muppet Wiki (yes!) it is from '77.


The final section of chorus, with the "Benny, Benny, Benny"-echo chorus of the dolls is golden.

Summer: Pics or It Didn't Happen

By popular demand - pictures, somewhat sorted and slightly cleaned up, from our lovely summer vacation:

Sommer 2012