As the year 1970 approached, an up-and-coming British hard rock band called Deep Purple had a crazy idea. With a soaring new vocalist in Ian Gillan and a bassist/producer in Roger Glover replacing Rod Evans and Nick Simper, respectively, even fans forget that the new lineup’s first release wasn’t its 1970 breakthrough studio album Deep Purple in Rock.
Rather, it was the late-1969 live album Concerto for Group and Orchestra. Rounded out by guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, keyboardist Jon Lord and drummer Ian Paice, Deep Purple had recorded the performance in concert three months prior with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Malcolm Arnold, at Royal Albert Hall in London.
Fifty-five years later, area band Crazy Fingers (crazyfingers.net) likewise conducts such a popular music-meets-classical experiment with Boca Raton-based The Symphonia (thesymphonia.org), “South Florida’s Premier Chamber Orchestra.” As part of the City of Boca Raton’s “Summer in the City” concert series, the group and orchestra, conducted by Leonid Sigal, perform a free show together at Mizner Park Ampitheater on Friday.
Active for 20 years, The Symphonia’s impressive longevity is nonetheless dwarfed by that of Crazy Fingers. The South Florida Grateful Dead tribute act goes back nearly twice that long — to 1990, before anyone could’ve even predicted the region’s, and the nation’s, current tribute obsession.
”I think there’s still an original music scene here,” says founding Crazy Fingers drummer/vocalist Pete Lavezzoli. “I know a lot of musicians playing and writing originals among the cover and tribute acts. We’ve even recorded and released two albums of originals, which we sometimes play at shows, and which still get good responses mixed in with our Grateful Dead catalog.”
Together for nearly 35 years, what a long, strange trip it’s been indeed for Crazy Fingers, complete with personnel arrivals, departures, rearrivals, and even the untimely traffic fatality of singing multi-instrumentalist Corey Dwyer in 2014. The band’s current lineup is rounded out by founding bassist Bubba Newton, guitarist/vocalist Rich Friedman (who first joined in 1993), keyboardist/vocalist Josh Foster (1998), and guitarist/vocalist Johnny Nichols (2015).
This will not, however, be Crazy Fingers’ first foray into orchestral live performance — only their first locally. Two others preceded the forthcoming event, with each of the three having been the result of a symphonic organization reaching out to the band about performing together.
”In 2015, I was first approached by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra,” Lavezzoli says. “Someone who worked for them had come to South Florida and seen us, and they eventually asked if we’d be willing to travel up to New York to play a show with them. Which we did in July of 2015, at an outdoor ampitheater in Lewiston because it was offseason, and it went really well. They asked us to do it again during the winter season in February of 2020, right before COVID-19 hit, so we were able to play with them in their historic Kleinhans Music Hall.”
The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra was then conducted by Bradley Thachuk, musical director of the Niagara Symphony Orchestra, with orchestral arrangements by his twin brother, classical guitarist Steven Thachuk. Unlike most Grateful Dead shows, neither their performance — nor the one by Crazy Fingers nearly a half-century later — was recorded, adding to the mystery, allure, and perhaps even the historical significance.
”It was basically scheduled as a 50-year anniversary,” Lavezzoli says, “of when the Grateful Dead went to Buffalo to play in Kleinhans Music Hall with the Buffalo Philharmonic on St. Patrick’s Day of 1970. And it was probably more appropriate for Brad to conduct the show than the orchestra’s primary conductor, JoAnn Falletta, because he’d done combined shows with an orchestra and rock band, including one of Genesis material with their guitarist Steve Hackett.”
”When we realized it was nearly 50 years since the lost Grateful Dead performance, we knew it was a sign,” says Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra executive director Daniel Hart. “That show became not only a monumental piece of Dead fan history, but it also marked one of the earliest collaborations between a rock band and an orchestra.”
Steven Thachuk’s orchestral arrangements will remain for the forthcoming Boca Raton show, among other similarities. Instead of The Symphonia’s principal conductor, Alastair Willis, Moscow-born concertmaster and violinist Leonid Sigal (who’s worked with artists outside the classical realm) will man the baton. And the concert date falls exactly nine years to the day after Crazy Fingers’ symphonic debut with the Buffalo Philharmonic outdoors in Lewiston, N.Y.
”There’s a guy who works in marketing and publicity for The Symphonia,” Lavezzoli says, “and he’s a Deadhead who’s come to see us and knew about our Buffalo Philharmonic shows. Steven’s arrangements were so great that we decided to use them again. There will also be some intentional open spaces in the performance where the orchestra will lay out, allowing us to do some free improvising and go into some open, unstructured areas. Then we’ll cue the orchestra to come in afterward.”
Those cues usually come from Lavezzoli, a music instructor, audio books narrator, and radio broadcaster who’s authored two books, the Duke Ellington biography The King of All, Sir Duke and The Dawn of Indian Music in the West, with a foreword by sitar guru Ravi Shankar. And as a touring member of the national Grateful Dead jazz/fusion tribute act Jazz Is Dead, Lavezzoli succeeded drumming icons from the Mahavishnu Orchestra (Billy Cobham), Dixie Dregs (Rod Morgenstein) and Col. Bruce Hampton & the Aquarium Rescue Unit (Jeff Sipe). This drummer is also a classical music scholar, and familiar with that previously mentioned Deep Purple album.
”I’ve had that record since I was a kid,” he says. “I’ve always been interested in any collaborations between rock bands and orchestras, so I have recordings like that by Deep Purple, the Moody Blues, and Procol Harum.”
If You Go
The Symphonia and Crazy Fingers perform at Mizner Park Ampitheater, 460 Plaza Real, Boca Raton.
When: 8 p.m. Friday. July 12
Admission: Free
Info: 561-393-7890, myboca.us