An Interview With Ritchie Blackmore & Candice Night
Mr. Blackmore -
1) As a child, what did you aspire to be and when did you discover your talent with the guitar?
I wanted to be a trumpet player like the people I was listening to growing up. But then my father bought me a guitar and said "if you don't play this, I'll break it over your head". So I started taking lessons, but got bored with them and then just started teaching myself. I always related more to the guitar than I did to people.
2) What artists did you admire growing up prior to your own music career?
Big Jim Sullivan, Scotty Moore, Chet Atkins, Buddy Holly, Bob Dylan, to name a few.
3) Blackmore's Night is quite a departure from the classic rock which typified the first 30 years of your career. What was the appeal of a Renaissance-era style sound?
I had been listening to Renaissance Music since 1971 when I first saw the BBC's Wives of Henry the 8th. I first heard David Munrow and the Early music consort of London and was immediately drawn to that music. It was so honest, something you dont find in todays music. I loved the sound of the pagentry music, the sackbutts and crumhorns and shawms. It was the rock music of that day. Even while writing DP songs, for example, Smoke on the Water, the riff is done in 4ths and 5ths- a medieval modal scale. It makes it appear more dark and foreboding. Not like todays pop music 3rds. We were even doing some renaissance based ideas in Rainbow, like Temple of the King, or 16th Century Greensleeves, so you could say that the Renaissance music has been an influence in my music from early on.
4) How much of a muse has Ms. Candice Night been in relation to the creation of music for Blackmore's Night?
Its good because she's always around and when I come up with a musical idea, its not like you have to call the band up and they clear their schedule and clock in and clock out. We are around each other all the time and are able to work on these creative ideas daily. Although she had never heard this music before I introduced it to her, she has an incredible ear and is able to pick up on songs very quickly and immediately play them on the renaissance woodwinds. She picks up on them much quicker than I can. So we are a good balance for each other. I also really enjoy feminine melodic vocals and her voice is reminiscent of some of the female voices I like, Maggie Reilly, Abba, the tones are very pleasing. Its perfect for this type of music.
5) What have been the positive and negative aspects of career success?
Positive is that I can pay the bills. Negative is that I have to pay too many taxes.
6) In your opinion, what is the state of today's music industry?
Serious but not hopeless. The mediums are changing because the independent thinkers are looking for other places to obtain music since you cant seem to find it on the radio, or on tv anymore. That's only tailor made for 16 year olds. So, people who are looking for something different wont listen to mainstream stations because they know that its not there. There are some amazing bands out there, but you wont hear them on the radio or see them on tv so you need to look outside the box to find them. Its worth the searching, though.
7) What advice would you offer to someone wanting to pursue a career in music?
After you've learned your 3rd chord, get yourself a good lawyer.
Where do you see yourself ten years from now?
Doing exactly what I'm doing now, and maybe sitting at the bottom of the garden eating fruit.
Ms. Candice Night...
9) What artists did you listen to you growing up that most influenced your drive to become a musician?
Candice- My house was always full of music, so whether my parents were dancing in the kitchen Sunday mornings while cooking breakfast to Benny Goodman and big band sounds, or playing show tunes on the piano and having the family sing along we were always surrounded by music. During my teen years I was very much into classic rock music and generally whatever was on the radio at that time. When I was 18 I started working for a rock radio station here on Long Island because music was always my great escape. Other people turned to other avenues of escapism, but for me, to turn on my walkman and be lead to another world through lyric and melody was such an incredible journey. My school books were covered with lyrics and I was basically obsessed with the heights of elation and the depths of melancholy that music could dictate to your emotional being. I really liked Stevie Nicks, not only because the words she sang were so different from the norm, very mystical and magical, but also her ability to never lose her femininity. Even in the 80's while every other woman in rock was wearing skin tight leather outfits, she was still in layered gauze and chiffon spinning on stage like a witchy ballerina. The presence was mesmerizing. She was a great inspiration at that point. These days I listen to a lot of European artists like Maggie Reilly and Sara Brightman because I'm not finding a lot of that mysterious presence in music that so intrigues me here on America radio. It still exists, but the mainstream in the USA is not my taste. Its too corporate run and commercialism rules. That sort of music repels me as opposed to enticing me. So, I search for other avenues.
10) What song in your repertoire holds the most personal meaning to you?
I really like the story songs that we wind up doing because it allows me, as the lyricist, to be able to form a character. With the stories I want to be able to, not just have people feel as if they are being told a tale, but for them to be there in the storyline as well. To experience it, see what the character is seeing, feel what they're feeling and see reflections of themselves in it so they relate on a deep emotional level. So, although it is very difficult to pick a "favorite", I'd have to say for today it is "Hanging Tree" from Fires At Midnight and "Windmills" off of Village Lanterne. But they all have a personal meaning. You have to put a piece of yourself into each song you create. If it doesn't mean something deep to you, it isn't worth creating.
11) How did you meet Ritchie Blackmore and how did the creation of Blackmore's Night evolve?
Ritchie and I met on a soccer field in 1989. I was working for a radio station and his people called up and asked if we wanted to play a soccer charity match. So, we did. He stacked his team with ringers and my team was some very unathletic DJs and they basically beat us very badly. Afterwards I went over to congratulate him on the win and ask for an autograph and he sent his roadie through the crowd to ask me to meet him later. I met up with him at a local pub and we talked all night long. He said it was like seeing an old friend again. We had so much in common. After that we kept in contact and became close friends before anything romantic happened. It was a very natural evaluation, like in any relationship. In 1993 he asked me to go on the road with him and Deep Purple. I was always singing around the house or hotel room so he asked if I would sing the background part on his Difficult to Cure solo/Beethoven's 9th in Czechoslovakia in front of 15,000. Later on in 1995 he reformed Rainbow and they were very unhappy with the singer's lyrics. He called me and played some backing tracks over the phone. I took the ferry up to Massachusetts and by the end of the 1 hr 15 minute ferry ride I had 14 verses for them. They were able to choose what they wanted out of those and by that process I was able to co-write 4 songs on the album Stranger In Us All. Because I was around the studio, when they needed a female backing voice they'd ask me to sing on it. Then while the rest of the guys were doing their tracks, Ritchie and I would be sitting by the fireside with an acoustic guitar writing songs just for ourselves. Our own escape from the stress and pressures of the day. When our friends heard them and enjoyed what we were doing we thought, maybe we should put it out for the rest of the world to hear. That was almost 10 years ago and we're still going strong, with our latest album , Winter Carols, debuting at #7 on Billboards New Age charts in the US. Its been a very interesting journey.
12) What has been your most memorable performance to date?
That is really hard to choose. We do a lot of shows in 12-15th century castles in Europe and UNESCO sites like the salt mines outside of Krakow, Poland where the stage, the chandeliers...everything is carved of salt! The castle shows are incredible because all the castles are so different, each with their own identity, and when you have a few thousand people in the courtyard, dressed in costume, singing your songs with the castles walls surrounding them, the church bells ringing in the distance and the moon rising over head, there is no better visual. To have that once in your life is amazing. We're lucky enough to get it all the time. They captured it pretty well on our DVD Castles and Dreams, but to be there and experience it all with that energy...its magic!
13) What do you enjoy doing when you get some free time?
Its rare to get free time in this business, you're either touring, promoting and doing interviews or writing and recording year round, but in my quiet time I just enjoy being with my 2 cats, gardening, bird watching and photographing nature. I also do a lot of work with my community to help preserve open space, and raise funds for animal charities locally and worldwide.
14) What is your favorite Deep Purple song and similarly, what is your favorite Rainbow song?
I'd have to say my favorite DP song is probably Perfect Strangers. Though we do a few old Purple and Rainbow songs onstage and breathe new life into them BN style. We re recorded Child In Time on the Village Lanterne cd as well as a duet with original vocalist Joe Lynn Turner on our rendition of one of my favorite Rainbow songs: Street Of Dreams. In this band its nice to have the freedom to do any kind of music you want. Folk, rock, renaissance, pop, ballads, instrumentals, tavern music...we do it all! Once you have that creative freedom its impossible to go back into a box of doing only one kind of music.
15) You have an incredible voice. When did you first publicly realize that you had the talent to be a singer?
Thank you for saying that! I never really publicly realized it. I was in denial until about 5 seconds before stepping on the stage at our first gig in Japan in front of 5,000 people and had to hold onto the mic stand till I stopped shaking! I always knew I wanted to be around music, just never thought I'd be the one front and center stage. Now, I just have fun with it. I get a lot of inspiration from melodic female singers like Karen Carpenter. I don't try to follow fashions and trends which will be gone in 5 minutes anyway. I'm not a screaming type of singer nor do I do the vocal scales that so many females to today. To me melody and the lyric are the most important things in the song. So, I stay true to my own vocal style and don't try to be like anyone else. Everyone has their own identity and it should shine through no matter what you do.
16) What are your expectations for Blackmore's Night in the coming years?
We never really set into anything with a particular direction. I know next year well have a new DVD coming out filmed in Paris and possibly a box set for the 10 year anniversary. Other than that, just keep going on as we are, enjoying ourselves and having others enjoy the music too.
17) If your story was to be made into a film, what should it be titled?
If Dreams Could Sing...
Accueil 
Dernières images 
