hopephotographyROCKS: time for the guys.

Let's see if we can narrow down the favourite male singer category. In my younger years I know for sure that my two favourites were Robert Plant from Led Zeppelin and Jon Anderson from Yes. In my early record collecting days I am sure that I had every album by these two bands (as well as their solo efforts), and listened to them over and over and over. By the way I still have all those vinyl treasures for all you vinyl fans out there...and I know you are out there. Through the years I have had many favourites, they tend to come and go depending on what I am into at the time. A small taste of that list would look like this Geddy Lee, Ian Gillan, Elton John, Sammy Hagar, Gary Cherrone, Joe Jackson... well I could go on and on as variety is the spice of life. In keeping with the theme of my rock photography for the favourite today we will focus on Jon Anderson. I was a major Yes fan in the day and still enjoy them to this day. I was viewing some videos of Yes on You Tube the other day, the song Close to Edge to be more specific. I could not believe how much that took me back. I do not think I could ever hear that album too much, for me it is a classic and in my top 10 for sure. I had the pleasure to see Yes perform in the round and for some reason the year escapes me. It was either 1978 or 1979, so if anyone knows it please let me know. It was a different to shoot as the musicians were always moving around. Then there was Jon Anderson dressed head to toe in bright white, a real photographic challenge, anytime he was in the frame it wreaked havoc with the old exposure meter. Those images were crazy difficult to print in the old darkroom days you could get cramps in the shoulders trying to burn that white suit in. With digital and the scanner it is quite a bit easier but still a substantial amount of work with multiple scans and layers for each image. But well worth it. Following is a sample of images from that Yes show of yet to be determined date.