To our knowledge, no information (other than contractual credit) has ever been released by EMI or by Vanessa Mae's office, about Mike's part in the breaking of Vanessa Mae as an artist. We asked Mike to tell the story in his own words...

The following notes for this site- by M Batt 5/2/2000

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Vanessa Mae! Ah, yes, Vanessa Mae... one of THOSE projects. Like most projects this was a mixed blessing, but a blessing nevertheless.

How it all started.

My friend, Mel Bush the promoter and manager of David Essex came to me and asked if I would be interested to meet the relatively little-known 14-year-old Vanessa and her mother. He explained that he had signed Vanessa for management, and would like me to consider producing her. We all met at my home in London, and there did seem to be some very useful mutual energy there. Vanessa was clearly determined to "make it" - her parents had already financed some recordings of classical repertoire when Vanessa was as young as ten. Vanessa was unclear as to what musical direction to take, but the one thing she knew was that she would stop at nothing to become rich and famous! This was clear from the outset. I explained that, coincidentally, I had been about to start composing a violin concerto. Pamela (Vanessa's mum) and the others said that this wasn't really what they had in mind. They wanted full-on pop success. Mel was very much a supporter of, shall we say, my "commercial abilities" in the area of being able to make a great pop record,- a facet of me which I cannot deny- and which I am happy to have fun with at any opportunity!

The material

With Pamela and Vanesssa - (Vanessa to a lesser extent) - being "died in the wool classical people" I was struck by the contrast between their naivete about contemporary popular music and recording techniques, mixed with Vanessa's natural urge to be contemporary and poppy. She played me a Michael Jackson record as an example of what she wanted to do- also a Whitney Houston record (I think it was "Let's Hear it For The Boy"). I couldn't quite see how we were going to make a violinist sound like that! But anyway it was a starting point. I said I thought we ought to decide between recording "popped-up" versions of classical repertoire pieces, well known pop tracks "covered" in classical style, or new compositions. After the meeting, I wrote to them, saying I thought we should have a go at "Toccata and Fugue in D minor" by J.S. Bach. I didn't think Bach would mind, what with him being dead and everything.

After several meetings, the feeling was pretty clear that they liked the Toccata idea, but wanted me to write something new. To establish the style (since a wide range of styles is prevalent in my compositional activity) we went through lots of albums of mine,- and Vanessa particularly liked a track from my "Songs Of Love And War" album,-on SONY records- called "Scorpio Prelude". It is a frenetic mixture of urgent rhythms and sudden changes of style, very typical of me in my most energetic schizophrenic compositional mood. I said that I would be happy to compose a set of pieces for her, in that vein, but with plenty of virtuosic violin parts to stretch her, or rather, (as with a concerto or other solo piece) to show off her technique. It was clear that, however undeveloped she was, in terms of emotions and life experience, she had a formidable technique in terms of getting around the fingerboard rapidly and accurately. Her "feel" was also excellent- however disdainful critics have been about her. I nevertheless felt that her strength was in rapid, virtuosic passages rather than slow, moving, emotional pieces.

I therefore set about writing the pieces, and because building work was going on in our home, and there was lots of dust everywhere, I rented a flat in Hyde Park Square- near where we lived- and spent several weeks writing, sending the finished pieces to Vanessa to study and learn, and of course inviting her comments on whether or not she liked them. The violin parts were fully written out, against a score which was mainly for electronic instruments, notated in keyboard notation. Some of the scores called for orchestral accompaniment. the pieces were:

Toccata and Fugue in D minor (my arrangement of the Public Domain work)

Contradanza (MB)

Warm Air (MB)

Jazz Will Eat Itself (MB)

Widescreen (MB)

Tequila Mockingbird (MB)

City Theme (MB)

Plus new arrangements of my "Theme from Caravans" and Mason Williams' "Classical Gas"- the latter, a flashily virtuosic arrangement of the guitar piece which I had remembered from when it had been a hit years earlier.

We went in to record the album after Mel had presented the idea to EMI Classics (Roger Lewis) and secured a recording deal.

One of the things I suggested at the very first meeting was that Vanessa should explore the idea of electric violin. To help this on, I went searching for a suitable instrument, and eventually found the famous white electric violin that she still plays today. Once I had arranged the deal to acquire the instrument- together with a small amplifier for rehearsal purposes- her management bought it and she began fiddling about at home with it. I had been anxious to find one with a midi transducer fitted so that we could put it through various sound modules and allow her not inconsiderable talent to explore the possibilities of playing a violin and yet sounding like a shower of cosmic rain or something! However, the underlying truth is that a classically trained (rather than folk or rock) violinist is usually going to sound best using a violin sound. In my opinion, Vanessa sounds best on a real violin, and the white electric one is a great tool for her to present herself as "poppy"- and in fact that's how it turned out. Often, she mimes on TV using the white electric, when in fact the track she is miming to has been recorded using the proper violin!

I created the backing tracks in my own studio, from proper written-down scores, and with the help of engineer and programmer, Gareth Cousins. He's very good at getting good drum samples and interesting sounds from sample discs. I even ordered a sample disc of African and other ethnic sounds from which I took some chanting Africans to use in Toccata and Fugue! (If you're reading this, Gareth, I think you accidentally walked off with the sample disc- can I please have it back!??) Then we went into a bigger studio (Whitfield Street Studios London W1) and recorded the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra playing my arrangements of the orchestral parts of the scores. I conducted. Vanessa was not present at these recordings, although she did turn up to ask me a question about one of my pieces, in the coffee break, and then left before the session resumed.

Once the tracks were complete Vanessa and Pamela attended Abbey Road studios, where we recorded the violin solos as an overdub. Interestingly, I was once again taken by the contrast between Vanessa's virtuosity and relative experience at classical recordings, and the seeming lack of knowledge or experience they had regarding the possibilities afforded by modern recording techniques. The idea of overdubbing (playing along to the recording while listening to it on headphones) was totally new, and the layering of sounds upon each other was a new and magical territory for them- one which Vanessa adapted to very quickly. The violin solos were recorded note-for-note as I had written them, and in fact there was even a synthesizer playing the identical part in Vanessa's headphoes so that she could orientate herself in relation to the backing track. Gareth and I called it the "shadow"- indeed it sounded like a softer version of the violin- a sort of buzzy, analogue sound. The "shadow" was, in fact, included in the mixes of the final sound balance of the album- so that Vanessa's acoustic violin, mixed with "the shadow" synthesizer gave an illusion of an electric violin.