Tony Kaye

For much of his career, Tony Kaye was mostly known as the man that Rick Wakeman replaced in Yes in 1971, just in time to become a superstar keyboard player rivaling Keith Emerson. More serious fans of Yes knew him somewhat better, as the inspired if not overly showy keyboard virtuoso on what is usually regarded as the first fully realized Yes LP, The Yes Album. Then, in the 1980s, he was back in Yes, remaining long enough to participate in the eight-man "mega-Yes" lineup that gave Kaye his taste of the international success that he'd just missed at the outset of the 1970s, and belatedly raised his recognition level to extraordinary heights. Born Anthony John Selridge on January 11, 1946, Tony Kaye was a natural musician, his grandmother having been a concert pianist and his grandfather a jazz saxophone player. He showed an early affinity for the piano and began taking lessons at age four. He showed a strong interest in classical music as a child, and by age 12 he was giving concerts locally. Kaye continued taking formal music lessons up to age 18, but by that time he had developed aspirations other than a career as a classical musician. He'd discovered jazz in his mid-teens, beginning with Dixieland, and was playing in a trad-jazz band while still in school. His interests remained split between jazz and classical until he encountered the work of Duke Ellington and Count Basie, after which he abandoned his goals as a classical musician. At 15, he joined his first working band, the Danny Rogers Orchestra. This accompanied his beginning to study of the art of arranging, which was to serve him well in the years to come. Faced with the choice of becoming a music teacher or a concert pianist -- a goal for which he doubted he had the talent -- Kaye chose to bide his time by...