Music for Montserrat

Music for Montserrat (1997)

Music For Montserrat is a concert, held on September 15, 1997 in the Royal Albert Hall. Musicians came together for Montserrat. Phil Collins, Ray Cooper, Carl Perkins, Jimmy Buffett, Mark Knopfler, Sting, Elton John, Eric Clapton, Paul McCartney, and more. The concert, and proceeds from the DVD and CD, benefited a cultural center in Montserrat, built by George Martin.

Date of release
1997-09-15
TMDB
6.9 / 10 (7)
Runtime
1h 52m
Genres
Music
Director
Julia Knowles

Casting

Interesting facts

Music for Montserrat was a benefit concert held on 15 September 1997 at the Royal Albert Hall. The event was organised by Sir George Martin, former producer for the Beatles and founder of Associated Independent Recording, to raise funds for the Caribbean island of Montserrat after a major volcanic eruption by the Soufrière Hills volcano earlier that year.

Background

The island of Montserrat is a British Overseas Territory, nicknamed the "Emerald Isle of the Caribbean" in British culture due to its resemblance to coastal areas of Ireland and history of Irish migration.

In July 1979, George Martin's AIR Studios built 'AIR Montserrat', a recording studio situated on the west side of the island. The studio became a cultural attraction for the island and created a culture of rock and pop music, offering the technical facilities of its London counterpart studio, with the alternative of an exotic location for international bands.

From the period from 1979 to 1989, over 70 albums were recorded in the studio, including Hot Hot Hot, Synchronicity and Brothers in Arms.

In September 1989, tropical cyclone Hurricane Hugo travelled across the north-eastern Caribbean region, affecting approximately 2 million people. By the time the storm hit the island it was classified as a Category 4 hurricane, was Montserrat's costliest hurricane on record, dismantling the power infrastructure of the island and destroying ninety percent of the buildings and structures.

In referencing the forced closure of the studio, Martin said:"After ten great years of recording there the music business had changed...the moguls running the business no longer wanted their artists miles away, outside their control."

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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