Thursday 29 October 2026
Royal Albert Hall, London
★★★★
Steven Wilson bids farewell to space with an ambitious orchestral version of The Overview, and looks forward to his next, earthbound album, Requiem for a Village
Shortly after Steven Wilson was born, a landmark concert took place in the Royal Albert Hall. Deep Purple joined the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Malcolm Arnold, in Jon Lord’s Concerto for Group and Orchestra. A contemporary reviewer described it as, ‘one of the dullest attempts yet at the fusion of rock and the European classical tradition.’ The band’s guitarist Ritchie Blackmore thought it was ‘a total gimmick.’ Orchestra members were sceptical about the attempted fusion of genres, but Arnold, himself a composer, admired Lord’s score and told the orchestra to take it seriously.
Nearly sixty years later, the idea of a band playing with an orchestra has been fully accepted; the BBC embraced it recently in the Royal Albert Hall in the Prog Rock Prom, featuring the BBC Concert Orchestra and prog luminaries Peter Hammill and Carl Palmer, and prog rock fan Guy Garvey. On Wednesday and Thursday this week, Steven Wilson and his band were joined at the hall by Parallax Orchestra and Sansara choir, conducted by Tom Richards to perform an arrangement for Group and Orchestra of his eighth studio album, The Overview, arranged by the orchestra’s co-founder, Simon Dobson. Wilson toured the band version of the album last year.
On Thursday, before the orchestra took the stage, Wilson played a set with his usual touring band: Randy McStine (guitar), Nick Beggs (bass), Adam Holzman (keyboards), and Craig Blundell (drums). He announced he hadn’t planned the first-half setlist; Wednesday’s concert featured two tracks, Luminol and Ancestral, which he replaced on Thursday with classics Home Invasion/Regret #9 and The Raven That Refused to Sing.
Wilson quipped that they had picked Home Invasion… as it was a ‘nice easy one to start with’. The song was superb, with a phenomenal bass sound from Beggs, gorgeous backing vocals, a lovely extended Moog solo from Holzman, and a final guitar solo from McStine that was didn’t make the mistake of trying to replicate Guthrie Govan’s stunning solo on the original. The opening piano chords from The Raven… were greeted with a huge cheer. Wilson’s voice was passionate on ‘Sister I lost you’, but a bit later announced that he had forgotten the words. Blundell’s drumming was fearsome, making this a heavier version of the song that drew a standing ovation.
Both concerts featured three new songs from Wilson’s forthcoming album, Requiem for a Village, which I heard previewed in June before the album even had an official title. He has since released three singles from the album. Requiem for a Village began with Wilson’s strong falsetto vocals, a heavy drum and bass pattern with offbeat rhythms from Blundell, driving guitar and spiky keyboards from Holzman. The song was played with urgency, Wilson almost rapping with great intensity and immediacy. An almost prog-metal riff made the song thrillingly visceral, perfect in a live context.
On Chapel Slope was more experimental, with Nick Beggs playing a drone on an upright bass, and Blundell providing muscular drumming. The spaciousness and sparseness of the sound recalled Talk Talk. The song ended with an increasingly desperate-sounding chanted chorus. The final song of the triptych was A Basket of Bees. Wilson said it was hard for him to perform, as it contains enough material (in a song that lasts just under eight minutes) for a 30-minute song; it felt like a song by prog-rock titans Yes. It’s built around a very simple melody, an evocative falling theme, and has a quirky, unusual feel. It began with Wilson’s solo voice, subtle drumming from Blundell, and McStine playing a gentle guitar solo with gorgeous tone. An incredibly proggy section followed, with Wilson scatting above as he did on Harridan on Porcupine Tree’s album, Closure/Continuation. The song ended with an explosive section, then came to a sudden halt. All three songs were intricately written prog mini-epics that bode well for the album’s release next week.
Objects Outlive Us, the first half of The Overview, opened with a gorgeous new orchestral section, with spectral string harmonies, sweeping folk melodies and mysterious-sounding upward glissandi. A pastoral woodwind interlude led to Wilson’s falsetto intro from the album. Scurrying strings and brass fanfares, plus a pizzicato variation on the theme from The Buddha of the Modern Age, led to Wilson’s Yes-like chant, with sweeping strings beneath the repeated notes in the vocal part, building to a stunning climax. A lovely new section, written for chamber strings, led to the song’s main 19-note piano motif, with symphonic strings decorating the melody.
The rockier section in Objects: Meanwhile was much heavier than on the album. The orchestra provided long notes offset against Blundell’s fierce drumming, and Sansara choir provided rich backing vocals. At times it felt as if the band were slightly obscuring the orchestral sound, although this may have been a localised acoustic effect caused by the design of the Royal Albert Hall. It was built before architectural acoustics became a science, although a great deal of time and effort has gone into improving the acoustics, including the ‘mushrooms’ that hang from the ceiling and a new loudspeaker system. Nick Beggs played the bass solo with an amazing tone, and the band took flight with stunning guitar solos from McStine and Wilson. The opening vocal theme returned on No Ghost on the Moor with shimmering stings and a lovely interplay between Wilson and the choir. McStine played his extended, heartfelt solo on Heat Death of the Universe above echoing drums. The final discordant section for orchestra echoed the music of Hungarian composer György Ligeti, used by Stanley Kubrick in his 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey,
The second part of The Overview, the title track, began with a gentle four-note harp theme and distorted radio voices, similar to those at the start of Pink Floyd’s Astronomy Domine (The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, 1967). A new, cinematic section, with eerie strings and rasping brass, reflected Wilson’s love of ‘cinema for the ears.’ This was perhaps the most effective orchestral segment of all, with pulsing orchestral sounds matching Wilson’s swirling synthesised loops. His use of live filters on the synth sequences was stunning. A glorious passage for orchestra and choir, with rich low brass, led to A Beautiful Infinity I where Wilson the astronaut floats in space, which was slow and atmospheric. Holzman’s piano solo was sublimely contemplative. A Beautiful Infinity II became a moment of epic beauty. The whole orchestra joined the clapping section from the original album, adding humour. Permanence featured McStine playing Theo Travis’ plaintive saxophone solo, above Holzman’s glassy chords and a long orchestral note. McStine perfectly evoked the lonely melancholy of the other side of the universe.
After a well-deserved standing ovation, Wilson and his band returned for an encore. He told us he was envious of other bands that persuade the audience to sing along. Apparently, the only country where that happens with his music is India, where audiences sing for him and provide backing vocals. He promised us an easter egg: Lazarus in an acoustic guitar and piano version. Wilson’s voice was lovely here, with Holzman’s liquid piano running below. Audience participation, singing and waving phone torches, made this song genuinely moving.
The orchestra returned for the second encore, joining the band in a fresh new version of Staircase, different from the album version but equally effective. The orchestra played with great verve and precision in the pizzicato sections, and McStine added a plaintive and bluesy guitar solo. Swirling strings, played in a repeated Philip Glass minimalist style, were matched by synth parts in the same style, leading to a meditative ending.
The concert showed the scale of Wilson’s ambition: an hour-long orchestral version of the 40-minute album The Overview, performed in only two concerts in London, which he has said he will never repeat or release as a recording. It marked an ending and a new beginning: a farewell to the space epic of The Overview and a look forward to the intimate village life of Requiem for a Village, with a few classic tracks added for good measure.
Now read on…
SANSARA Choir and Manchester Collective live in Manchester