“I’ve got a hole in my eardrum, so that’s why I never go in the sea. But because I lifted my head so far out of the water, I was able to float in the Dead Sea. I was just giddy with laughter, I couldn’t believe it,” the 67-year-old veteran vocalist of British progressive rock band Renaissance chortled into the phone last week from her home in Buck County, Pennsylvania.
Since the days in the 1970s when Renaissance was mentioned in the same breath as like-minded musical adventurers like Yes, Genesis and King Crimson, Haslam has maintained the knack of staying afloat in the choppy pop music waters.
While the band’s star never shone as brightly as it did in the 1974-78 range, when their classical, folk, rock and jazz-inflected albums like Turn of the Cards and Scheherazade and Other Stories featuring Halsam’s bell-like, five-octave voice turned them into FM rock radio darlings in the US, they’ve continued in various configurations to record and tour for the faithful.
“Back then, radio stations played long tracks off albums, and we were championed by some influential DJs in the US like Ed Sharkey from WMMR in Philadelphia and Alison Steele on WNEW-FM in New York,” said Haslam, who following the sudden death in 2012 of guitarist/songwriter Michael Dunford is the only current band member still active from their heyday.
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