Procol Harum leader Gary Brooker dies

Gary Brooker, the singer-pianist forever at the helm of Procol Harum, has died. He was best known for his stunning vocal performance on the group’s 1967 hit “A Whiter Shade of Pale.” Brooker was 76.

His other classics, written with lyricist Keith Reid, include “Conquistador” and “A Salty Dog.” Brooker’s sidelong epic “In Held ‘Twas in I” is considered a seminal prog work.

The English singer led Procol Harum for more than a half century. The Bach-influenced “A Whiter Shade of Pale” long ranked as one of the world’s top-selling and most-played singles.

Brooker died Feb. 19, at home in London, after a long fight with cancer.

“Gary’s voice and piano were the single defining constant of Procol’s 50-year international concert career,” Procol Harum said in announcing the death.

“Though sometimes regarded as ‘classical,’ his roots were in the blues, Ray Charles and Little Richard,” the group said. His first band was the Paramounts, which gigged with the top British beat bands of the early 1960s. Procol Harum was another animal, though, one of the first rock bands to incorporate classical sounds in a meaningful way.

The band’s web site noted that: “The last of some 40 Procol gigs involving the world’s most renowned orchestras and concert-halls was at the London Palladium; its predecessor was a notable live BBC Radio presentation.”

While much is made of Procol Harum’s classical leanings, the band also played hard rock and pub rock, often with a wry twist. Its adventurous and unorthodox albums influenced almost all psychedelic and progressive bands of the 1960s and 1970s. Procol Harum was a favorite on the rock festival circuit of those eras.

Brooker founded Procol Harum in 1966 with Keith Reid, who wrote the lyrics for almost all of the band’s songs. Its classic lineup included guitarist Robin Trower and organist Matthew Fisher. After Trower and Fisher left, Brooker continued the band until the late 1970s, and then revived it in 1991 and several times thereafter, with various versions active until 2019.

Key Procol Harum albums include “Procol Harum,” “Shine on Brightly,” “A Salty Dog” and “Broken Barricades.”

1971’s “Live: In Concert With the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra” was an unlikely hit that has seen a string of rereleases geared toward audiophiles. “It went ahead and opened up a great new vista for us,” Brooker said, referring to the classical-music crossover.

Brooker also released a quartet of solo albums.

The pianist and singer worked extensively with other rock artists, including Eric Clapton, Kate Bush, George Harrison, Ringo Starr and the Alan Parsons Project. He sang in the movie version of “Evita” and was ordered an MBE for his charitable efforts.

Brooker is listed as a co-writer of “A Whiter Shade of Pale,” an unlikely hit with its gothic-church-organ wash of sound. Initially credited as a 50-50 composition by Reid and Brooker, the song is now also credited to organist Fisher, following a 2009 lawsuit.

Brooker said the Beatles were big fans: “They absolutely loved ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale,’ he told Vintage Rock in 2019. “It affected them the same way it affected everybody. They weren’t immune.”

The band’s “Song for a Dreamer,” spearheaded by Trower, ranks No. 39 on this web site’s list of the greatest psychedelic music songs. The band has never been nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Brooker’s survivors include his wife (since the mid-1960s), Franky.