The Moody Blues With The London Festival Orchestra Conducted By Peter Knight

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Few albums in rock history pulled off such an unlikely pairing as Days of Future Passed, where the Moody Blues joined forces with the London Festival Orchestra, with the orchestral parts arranged and conducted by Peter Knight. Originally asked by Deram Records to record pop and classical covers with an orchestra, the band had other ideas. What came out instead was a concept album tracing a single day in the life of an ordinary person, original songs woven together with orchestral interludes, and a Mellotron giving the whole thing an almost symphonic weight. The album marked the arrival of guitarist and singer Justin Hayward and bassist John Lodge, who brought fresh songwriting to the group and helped steer it away from R&B covers toward something genuinely new. Tracks like Nights in White Satin became slow burn classics, and by 1972 the album had climbed into the US top ten. Rolling Stone later counted it among the most important albums of 1967.