The 'School of Rock" did not end with the Jack Black movie. Paul Green, the man who started it went on to form the Paul Green Rock Academy and they will be coming to the Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville and the Ocean City Music Pier on Aug 9th. Performing with them will be the legendary Jon Anderson co-founder of the iconic rock band YES along with Chris  Squire.

This Jon Anderson with The Paul Green Rock Academy tour is a resumption of the tradition that started in 2005 when Jon toured with the original School of Rock all-stars.

 

Paul Green
Paul Green
AP
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"I was actually doing a show in Philadelphia with YES 20 years ago, and Paul Green came by with a dozen teenagers with School Of Rock tee shirts and I said "OK what the hells going on?"

Green and Anderson "Got along quite well and within a month Jon and his wife Jane went to Philadelphia "just to see what it's like to work with young teenagers and it was a blessing in many ways for me to realize that there is a future in music for these young kids  because they don't mess around"

Anderson was surprised by how much these students knew about music.

"When I got to the rehearsal, they were rehearsing a Frank Zappa piece and I said "Wait a minute!, This is too crazy,  and then they just turned around and said we're going to play "Heart of the Sunrise" and I thought "Good luck" low and behold, they played it note for note and that's when I was sort of seriously involved"

 

So the Andersons some other parents and these dedicated young rockers went on tour together in a blizzard to places like Albany and Pittsburg. "We're on the freeways and you couldn't see anything, it was amazing that we actually got to the gigs and gave really good performances"

How does it feel playing with all these young talented kids? Take you back to your youth? " I definitely feel young at heart, that's for sure" says Anderson "and it's exhausting! he says jokingly, "Somebody asked me about it yesterday and I said I'm going on tour with about 25 young teenagers, What could go wrong?"

But seriously folks.

"We've been rehearsing" says Anderson, "I just heard a mix of "Heart of the Sunrise" which we've done again with these new kids, I call them kids but they're teenagers, and they're singing it and they're playing it"

Anderson had a suggestion for something different for these shows as well.

Yes
Andy Kropa/Invision/AP
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"I said when we do the shows instead of going from Yes song to Yes song, why don't we some mashing up, so we've got a really good song by INXS and that goes into Long Distance Runaround, and we've got Kashmir be Led Zepplin which is one of my favorite songs of all time going into "Don't Kill The Whale" and we're also going to do a couple of songs from an album I did a couple of years ago "1000 hands" called "Makes me Happy" and Starship Trooper, Owner of a Lonely Heart, all the classic Yes songs from way way back even one of the first songs I did with YES was called "Sweet Dreams"

Speaking of YES, I asked Jon Anderson if he could see himself reuniting with his old band which is now broken up into  Anderson Rabin and Wakeman and YES ?

"Oh Yeah, I'm sure it will happen one day" says Anderson, "Rick Wakeman always used to joke that we'll be in one of those chairs with wheels"

Rick Wakeman
Rick Wakeman Joel Ryan/Invision/AP
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Of course it unfortunately will be without Chris Squire who passed away in 2015 from acute erythroid leukemia. Says Anderson of his "best ever brother in every sort of way"

Chris Squire
AP
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" I was very blessed to witness him going into heaven" Jon reveals to me "

"It was in a dream that I had when I was in Maui with my wife, I could see him going into heaven. There was an angel next to him and then the following day somebody emailed me that Chris died last night and I said yeah I saw him" it was then Jon got understandably emotional. "I said Goodbye. He had little spirits in his eyes because he loved me so much and I loved him"

See Jon Anderson with the Paul Green Rock Academy Aug 7th at the Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville and Aug 9th at the Ocean City Music Pier. To get tickets click here.

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