NIGHT OF THE PROMS
The Nokia Night of the Proms is a very succesful
yearly event in the Netherlands,Belgium and Germany, "where classic
meets pop". Every year a symphonic orchestra is joined by
pop and rock artists to give several concerts. During these concerts
the orchestra plays well-known classical highlights like "the
Wilhelm Tell overture" and is a back-up band for artists
like Oleta Adams, Al Jarreau, Roger Hodgson (ex-Supertramp), Joe
Cocker, etc.
Toto was the first rock-band to perform at the Night of the Proms
in 1994 playing "Africa", "Rosanna", "I'll
be over you" and "I won't hold you back". The concerts
were recorded and broadcasted by Veronica (a Dutch tv-station)
and BRTN (the Belgian National Tv-station) and later on a CD was
released, containing "I won't hold you back" and
"Rosanna" ("Night of the proms '94", EVA 8318142).
The Night of the Proms was the first time Toto performed live
since they ended the "Kingdom of Desire"-tour in 1992.
The band played 'the stars outta heaven' and had a great time
being onstage, which might have been a sign to continue as a band.
In 2003 TOTO was asked for the 2nd time to Headline the Night of the Proms concert series.
Back in 1992 the whole Night of the Proms tour was only about 8 shows in total, 9 years later
the concert series had developed to the most popular concert series in Europe, playing almost 60
shows in 3 months including 4 sold out weeks in the Sportpalais in Antwerpen/Belgium in front of 16.000 people a night.
Shortly after the first shows in October 2003, tragedy struck the band again, when Simon Phillips got seriously ill after the first few shows.
While they had shows almost every night, there was hardly any time to react and search for solutions, INXS drummer Jon Farriss offered to help
TOTO out for the next few shows. As this was no final solution the band and management eagerly tried to find a first class drummer from their
so called "A-List" of musicians who are able to play the TOTO songs in a satisfying way. As Gregg Bissonette unfortunately was busy doing
a sold out clinic tour, they finally got Ricky Lawson (Phil Collins, Eric Clapton, Steely Dan) to play with them for the next 2 months.
On November 14th David Paich had to leave the Proms to get back to L.A. to take care of his ill sister and Greg Phillinganes took over the Keys.
The band had quite a unique line-up back then.
Despite all the bad luck they had back then the whole NOTP-Tour was a huge success and the band
performed in front of more than 600.000 people in total and it was the best selling concert tour in late 2003 worldwide!