Paul Buckmaster

An overview of some Paul Buckmaster work.

Elton John - "I Need You To Turn To"
Paul Buckminster did the arrangement and orchestration for this song, as well as others on Elton John's eponymous 1970 album.


Arguably one of the Rolling Stones' most beautiful songs, from Sticky Fingers (1971). Life was breathed into "Moonlight Mile" by Mick Taylor and Mick Jagger in an overnight session--its genesis being a short guitar piece Keith Richards had been toying around with, and which he was calling "Japanese Thing"--and enhanced by Paul Buckmaster's string arrangement. One of my favorite Buckmaster contributions--perhaps because it's one of his more understated efforts.

1972 - Harry Nilsson singing "Without You," written by Badfinger's Pete Hamm, and with Paul Buckmaster's rather florid string arrangement. I can appreciate the song overall, but it aches Nilsson/Buckmaster histrionics.

Incidentally, in contrast, here's Badfinger's original--more guitary, piano-y Beatlesesque--version of "Without You."

More 1972: Carly Simon wrote this rather sappy anthemic song with James Taylor, string & woodwind orchestration by Paul Buckmaster. A stellar line-up of LA and other studio musicians were brought in for this album's recording sessions (including: Dr. John, Robbie Robertson, Bucky Pizzarelli, Jim Keltner, Jim Gordon, Bobby Keys, Klaus Voormann)

Buckmaster added strings and orchestra to Terrapin Station, coming in right around minute 4:04 and running another 12 minutes.

Understated for Buckmaster, sometimes seeming to work rather well with where the Dead was at, at that time--I'd long wondered how much of the bombastic and cinematic effects on this song were due to Buckmaster vs. how much Buckmaster was honoring and supporting the band's then-direction musically and lyrically.

A little research surfaced this anecdote from Bill Kreutzmann, indicating his opinion of Buckmaster's strings, and the context around them:

"Mickey had a cool timbale part that he recorded, with Garcia adding interplay on guitar. But Olsen had another idea. Without telling anyone in the band, he erased Mickey's part entirely and then hired a string section to fill out that passage instead. I was pissed off about it, but Mickey was deservedly outraged. Outraged. ... it was a very stupid thing to do. Mickey wasn't going to be had that easily, though, and so he and Garcia – who sided with Mickey – redid their part. Olsen wasn't going to give up either, so he made sure the strings remained in the final mix. The recorded version of 'Terrapin Station' is probably my least favorite version because of that. It sounds really grandiose, like somebody's ego is playing those strings."

Of the strings, choir, horns, and overall production, Jerry Garcia said Keith Olsen "put the Grateful Dead in a dress," adding, "It made me mad. He and Paul Buckmaster had an erroneous rhythmic sense; they changed it from a dotted shuffle to a marching 4/4 time." Phil Lesh said "The orchestral and choral sweeteners added to the title sequence by Olsen and Buckmaster were a classic example of gilding the lily," which I take to mean adding gratuitously to something that was naturally more beautiful.

Performances of Terrapin in early 1977: (a) most certainly do not suffer from the lack of Buckmaster's strings, and yet (b) are not entirely at odds with the underlying essence of the studio version, suggesting perhaps Buckmaster may have been successful in his job to shed light and not to master?
hear: Terrapin as encore - Capitol Theatre, April 27, 1977