The
musical version was written with an even
more dramatic concept as the book by H.G.
Wells in 1898. Jeff Wayne wrote it in
1978 and it was released on June 9, 1978
at the London Planetarium. It reached
platinum because it was for in the charts
for over six years and won a few awards.
It was sold six million times all over
the world and it was published in other
languages
like German, Spanish or French.
Two
singles of this CD became world famous:
The Eve of the War, and Forever Autumn.
In
1995 the Album of Jeff Wayne was released
with a new music technology. With four
new titles it was called “New Files
95”:
Jeff
Wayne was the son of the singer, actor
and musical producer Jerry Wayne who started
his musical career by making the story
of his father’s musical “Two
cities”.
When Jeff Wayne composed his musical version
he got help from Gary Osborne and Paul
Vigrass writing the lyrics and Doreen
Wayne who wrote the script on the basis
of the Wells novel. Richard Burton also
took part in the release of the musical
version. His voice is that of the narrator
of the story coming from the off and connecting
the music elements. In class we listened
to the introduction of the musical version,
and Burton’s voice is very impressive,
suitable for the threatening atmosphere.
Chris Thompson and Justin Hayward, both
members of the famous pop group ‘Moody
Blues’ (Nights in White Satin),
sang on it for example.
