Jon Lord’s Passing – A Fan’s Reaction [VIDEO]

Rock pioneer and Deep Purple keyboard player Jon Lord died yesterday at the age of 71. Here are a few of my random wandering thoughts.

There is so much I want to say about Jon that it was hard for me to get my thoughts in order and put them down in a readable manner, so please forgive me if this runs a little astray.

Jon had a long career that started in 1967 and he certainly did have a way with music. It seemed like in the late 1960's, everyone was jumping on the Moog synthesiser, but Jon rejected that idea and instead went with the Hammond B3 organ that Led Zeppelin later fell in love with, likely due to the way Deep Purple used it and the way that Jon played it.

Their first hit, Hush didn't have a screamin' guitar solo like many of the hard rock bands of the day did. Instead, they went with a keyboard solo that hooked my ear and instantly made me fall in love with their unique sound. Smoke On The Water is probably one of the first songs that many budding guitar gods learned to play. It's one of the first ones I learned when I picked it up at the age of 12 and Jon was a part of making that song what it is. It's also one of the songs I quickly obsessed over when I started learning the drums. I gave up piano at the age of nine, so there was no way I was going to learn the keyboard parts on that song ever.

Child in Time off Deep Purple in Rock for me epitomizes Jon Lord's talent and Mick Jones of The Clash actually sampled the keyboard solo intro from Deep Purple's Child in Time for Mick's other band, Big Audio Dynamite II's single, Rush.

Jon left Deep Purple for good in 2002 and had a successful solo career in the classical genre.

It scares me the rate that we are losing such musical talent and it scares me even more there are very few that are left that share such passion to carry the torch.

It's difficult to say "Rest in Peace, Jon" because you know heaven is rockin' now that Jon has joined the band. After a long battle with pancreatic cancer, Jon suffered a pulmonary embolism that claimed his life yesterday.

Watch here as Jon and his former band mates Ian Paice, Roger Glover and Ian Gillan talk about Jon, his love of the Hammond and how he crafted his signature sound.