Roger Waters - Documentary Behind The Wall Berlin 1990

Subtitles in Español, Francais, Deutsch and Portugues.

From the DVD Roger Waters The Wall Live In Berlin 1990

Happy New Year!

May what you see in the mirror delight you, and what others see in you delight them. May someone love you enough to forgive your faults, be blind to your blemishes, and tell the world about your virtues.

Happy New Year!!!

Toronto fans sing 'Happy Birthday' to Roger Waters

By JOHN CARUCCI, Associated Press | September 6, 2014

Photo By Frank Gunn/AP  Roger Waters, right, signs autographs as he arrives for the premiere of "Roger Waters: The Wall" at the Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto on Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014.

Photo By Frank Gunn/AP  Roger Waters waves as he arrives for the premiere of "Roger Waters: The Wall" at the Toronto International Film Festival in Toronto on Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014

TORONTO (AP) — Roger Waters celebrated his 71st birthday in style with a world premiere of his new documentary at the Toronto International Film Festival.

When the former Pink Floyd front man walked out on stage to introduce the film, a fan in the packed Elgin Theater screamed out happy birthday. That began an impromptu chorus of "Happy Birthday," and Waters graciously acknowledged his age with an expletive.

"Roger Waters: The Wall" chronicles his recent tour covering the seminal 1979 Pink Floyd album — as well as his inspiration for writing it.

Waters told the audience he began working with co-director Sean Evans five years ago to update the show with a more ecumenical and anti-war approach. Since it kicked off four years ago in Toronto, the tour has grossed nearly $500 million.

Waters came back out for the post-film Q&A to a standing ovation. Moderated by TIFF CEO Piers Handling, the question of Waters' strong political feelings and the criticism he received for it came up early.

Waters politely responded by saying that his strong, humane traits came from his parents, but he wasn't there to defend himself or fight with anybody.

The musician has spoken out about Israeli treatment of Palestinians and has refused to play any shows in Israel.

The film does not have a release date.

From www.chron.com

'Sparrows Will Sing' - Marianne Faithfull (lyrics written by Roger Waters)

'Sparrows Will Sing' was written by Roger Waters for Marianne Faithfull and is the first single from Marianne's 20th album 'Give My Love To London'.


 'Give My Love To London' is released on September 29th and sees Marianne collaborating with an impressive roll call of studio collaborators including Adrian Utley (Portishead), Brian Eno, Ed Harcourt and Warren Ellis & Jim Sclavunos (The Bad Seeds). Songwriting contributors and co-conspirators – with Marianne penning the majority of the lyrics – include Nick Cave, Roger Waters, Steve Earle, Tom McRae and Anna Calvi. Produced by Rob Ellis and Dimitri Tikovoi and mixed by Flood.

Hear Roger Waters’ Early, Work-in-Progress Recordings of Pink Floyd’s The Wall

June 17th, 2014

by Josh Jones

My first exposure to Pink Floyd’s rock opera The Wall left me feeling nothing less than astonishment. And though I never had the chance to see the outrageous stage show, with its very literal wall and giant inflatable pig, the film has always struck me as a suitably dark piece of psychodrama. Over a great many subsequent listens, the melodramatic double-album can still blow my mind, but I’ve come to feel that some of the strongest material are those songs penned jointly by Roger Waters and David Gilmour, and those are relatively few. (Mark Blake quotes Gilmour as saying “things like ‘Comfortably Numb’ were the last embers of mine and Roger’s ability to work collaboratively together.) The bulk of the album belongs to Waters, its autobiographical details and personal themes, and the album and film can sometimes feel as stifled and claustrophobic as its protagonist does. This is either a creative failing or a brilliant melding of form and content.

Inspired by an incident in which an exasperated Waters spat on a rowdy fan at a stadium show in Montreal during the band’s 1977 “In the Flesh Tour,” The Wall documents the painful rise and even more painful fall of a fictive rock star named, of course, Pink (played by Bob Geldof in the film version), whose life closely parallels Waters’, down to the spitting. It has always seemed an odd irony that Waters responded to the alienation of touring massive stadiums by creating a stadium show bigger than anything the band had yet done, but it speaks to the bassist and singer’s grandiose personality and obsessive desire to turn his angst into theater. Oftentimes the results were spectacular, other times bombastic and confusing (at least to critics, some of whom are easily confused). The recording of the album, as many well know, strained the band almost to breaking, and by many accounts, Waters’ imperiousness didn’t help matters, to say the least.




All of the behind-the-scenes drama may or may not eclipse the drama of the album itself, depending on your level of fandom and interest in Pink Floyd biography. Lovers of Waters’ epic rock dramaturgy will find edification at the extensive online critical commentary Pink Floyd The Wall: A Complete Analysis, an online work in progress that delivers on its title. For a very brief account of the story behind the story, co-producer Bob Ezrin’s interview with Grammy.com offers perspective from someone involved in the project who wasn’t a member of what came to seem like The Roger Waters’ Band. Ezrin describes The Wall as “Roger’s own project and not a group effort,” and his own role as “a kind of referee between him and the rest of the band.”

In the beginning we had a very long demo that Roger had written. We started to separate out the pieces, and when we looked at the storyline we realized what we needed was a through line, something to get us from start to finish.

Ezrin recounts that he “closed [his] eyes and wrote out the movie that would become The Wall,” handed the script out to the band, and marked songs missing from Waters’ demo as “’TBW’—‘to be written.’” (Among those songs was “Comfortably Numb.”)

The recordings at the top of the post—which surfaced in 2001 with the title Under Construction—represent a step in The Wall’s evolutionary development between Waters’ rudimentary demos (short excerpts above) and the completed album. (See the Youtube page for a complete tracklist. Contrary to the uploader’s description, Roger Waters certainly does not play all the instruments.) While Under Construction has generally been referred to as a “demo,” Rick Karhu of Pink Floyd fanzine Spare Bricks expresses his doubts about the use of a term he takes to denote “a fairly polished recording”: “Demos are not rough recordings or works-in-progress […]. I doubt very much that Under Construction is a demo of The Wall.”

It’s too rough around the edges—at times shockingly so—to be strictly considered a demo recording. At points, things are haphazardly edited together. Songs cut off abruptly, fade unexpectedly or drop out entirely for a moment as if someone at the mixing desk hit the wrong button at some point. Vocal tracks peak-out, often causing anguish to the listener’s ear drums. Some instrument lines (mostly the bass guitar) meander through the background as if the person playing is making up the part as they go. Equalization is nonexistent on most tracks. Overall, most of it sounds like a 4-track recording by a band who has only the vaguest notion of how the equipment works.

Lest we take this description as disparagement, Karhu clarifies: “It is precisely for those reasons […] that I love them dearly and consider them one of the most valuable, unauthorized Floyd recordings to be unearthed. Ever.” Many Youtube commenters agree, some even arguing that these rough sketches are superior to the final polished product. It’s a debate I won’t weigh in on, though I will say that like Karhu, I enjoy the lo-fi raggedness of this version of The Wall. It seems to convey the emotionally frayed edges of these songs in a way the slick production of the studio album may not at times. Either as a mere document of the album’s early history or an alternate, fragmented—and hence more traumatized—take on The Wall, this unofficial version is haunting and strange. Does it perhaps better represent Waters’ desire to make his psychic unease into art? We invite you to judge for yourselves. And if, like me, you can listen to “Comfortably Numb” (and that incredible guitar solo) on repeat for hours on end, you may be interested to hear David Gilmour discuss the song’s composition in the interview below.




Josh Jones is a writer and musician based in Durham, NC.

From www.openculture.com
 

New Roger Waters "The Child Will Fly" music video

Written by Matt
Saturday, 31 May 2014

Six years ago, Roger Waters recorded a song for the Fundación Alas, a foundation to help improve health and education for children in Latin America. Two years ago, Roger, who was in Buenos Aires performing a record breaking set of nine Wall concerts at the Estadio River Plate, chose the city to film the promo video for the song, which is called "The Child Will Fly".
Working with the Government of the City of Buenos Aires and with the support of the Spanish International Cooperation Agency, Alas made a contribution of $2 million for 22 early childhood centers serving more than 2,000 children in neighborhoods with high poverty levels.
The theme song was intended to help raise awareness about the importance of early education as a tool for children, with financial and cultural projects hopefully opening a world of greater possibilities. The track features the collaboration with Roger of different international and Latin artists such as Shakira, Eric Clapton, Pedro Aznar and Gustavo Cerati, who have worked actively with Alas.
The video features the artistic supervision of Roger Waters and was directed by Argentine Diego Kaplan and has just become available online - as you can see below.




The child will fly (making off)


From www.brain-damage.co.uk

Pink Floyd -The Wall Live at Nassau Coliseum - N.Y - 1980.02.27

Pink Floyd - The Wall Live at Nassau Coliseum - N.Y. - 1980/02/27 - Full Concert.

1º Part
01-Intro/In The Flesh?
02-The Thin Ice
03-Another Brick In The Wall (Part 1)
04-Happiest Days Of Our Lives
05-Another Brick In The Wall (Part 2)
06-Mother
07-Goodbye Blue Sky
08-Empty Spaces
09-What Shall We Do Now?
10-Young Lust
11-One Of My Turns
12-Don't Leave Me Now
13-Another Brick In The Wall (Part 3)
14-Goodbye Cruel World

2º : Part
01-Hey You
02-Is There Anybody Out There?
03-Nobody Home
04-Vera
05-Bring The Boys Back Home
06-Comfortably Numb
07-The Show Must Go On
08-In The Flesh
09-Run Like Hel
10-Waiting For The Worms
11-Stop
12-The Trial
13-Outside The Wall

The Band:

Roger Waters - Lead Vocals, Bass Guitar, Guitars, Percussion, Programming
David Gilmour - Lead Vocals, Lead Guitar
Richard Wright - Keyboards, Vocals, Organ, Piano, Synthesisers, Mellotron
Nick Mason - Drums, Percussion

"surrogate band" wearing masks, with Waters singing. The band consisted of ex-Status Quo's Andy Bown (bass), Willie Wilson (drums), Peter Wood (keyboards) and Snowy White (guitar; later Andy Roberts)

Roger Waters Paris interviews 2006

Roger Waters - In the Studio interview

Audio Roger Waters 1989 interview about The Wall recording.

Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) NY radio interview 1986

This is a radio interview (Scott Muni WNEW Radio New York) with Roger Waters with some questions by phone and talks are about Pink Floyd, Roger solo projects and politics.

Roger Waters & David Gilmour interview 1984

Audio interview The Inside Track with Roger Waters & David Gilmour 10-22-84. The Inside Track interview with Lisa Robinson.

The American University of Rome presents Roger Waters with Honorary Degree

February 19, 2014

Left to right: Provost Thompson, Chairman Battista, Roger Waters and President Hodges

A Doctorate of Humane Letters Honoris Causa Degree was awarded on the 18th of February 2014 to Roger Waters by The American University of Rome. Waters, who was the co-founder, lyricist, and conceptual leader of world famous progressive rock band Pink Floyd, and champion of veteran causes and human rights, was awarded for his contribution to music and for his social activism around the globe.

Accompanied by his wife Laurie Durning and by war veteran and close friend Harry Shindler, Waters was honored his degree before an intimate group of AUR students, veterans, faculty, and staff at the Istituto Italiano Studi Germanici in Rome following attendance of the Anzio commemoration ceremonies for the 70th anniversary of the Allied landings where his father, Eric Fletcher Waters of the 8th Royal Fusiliers, died as he fought to repel a German counter-attack in a battle that changed the course of the Second World War. Mr. Shindler, who also fought in the assault, was key in helping Waters locate the exact spot where his father fell.

Prof. James Walston, left, with WWII veteran of the battle at Anzio, Harry Shindler.

After receiving the Honoris Causa Degree, the social activist gave a short and concise talk directed to AUR students in which he recited a critical poem written in 2004 in light of the re-election of former US President George W. Bush.  He then encouraged AUR students to “make the world a much better place than it is now” and further highlighted his hopes that the current education system would focus on getting students interested in discovering and delivering the real truth about the issues of the world.

Waters then answered questions from AUR students regarding inspiration for his music, his thoughts on education, and his passion for veteran causes and human rights. Particularly, he shared with the audience that he finds the work he does with veterans to be the most rewarding of all. In a moving moment, he said “countries of the world really need to think more critically about the psychological situations they are putting their children in when they ask them to go to war”. The AUR Veterans Club concluded the ceremony by presenting Roger Waters with a Certificate of Appreciation in recognition of his father’s ultimate sacrifice and for Waters’ continued outreach to the veteran community.

From www.aur.edu

Recollections on Roger Waters

"AUR was quite magical on Tuesday night.  Awarding Roger Waters  an honorary degree was Harry Schindler’s idea, the 93-year veteran of Anzio who had located where Mr. Waters’ father had fallen on 18 February 1944, seventy years before. Modest and quite unlike a rock star vapidly consumed with fame, I had the fortune to hear Roger speak in public and then to quiz him about his life in private. Like his music, there is an epic dimension to his own history. 

I remember Pink Floyd from the late ‘sixties and I have a sense of ‘one more brick in the wall’, especially from the Berlin concert in 1990. But in all honesty their music passed me by. Now I rather regret this because Roger is a poet telling the particular stories of his generation.

During the question-and-answer session with the students, Waters spoke about being the son of a primary school teacher. He also revealed that he’d spent five years studying to be an architect. These are minor elements in ‘The Wall’. Perhaps more telling was his longer view of his personal history. His grandfather was a coal miner from the Durham pits who was called up to be a sapper. He died at Arras in the first days of the Somme, leaving a son – Roger’s father, who was aged about three at the time. So the grandfather never knew his son, any more than Roger knew the son, his father. His grandmother went into service and with determination sent her son, Roger’s father, to Durham University where he studied divinity. Eric Fletcher Waters taught at a school in Palestine before the Second World War, and when conscripted, he declared himself to be a pacifist. Driving ambulances in the blitz he met Roger’s mother, already a communist, and with time he decided to enlist. Anzio was the brutal, disorganized end chapter, an Arras in Italy. But of course it wasn’t the end.

The ceremony over, the students became bolder they pushed forward to get his autograph and to photograph him. Their unalloyed joy was quite something to behold! He is quite used to fame, of course, yet you can see that it belongs to a world he left behind long ago. He is focussed instead upon continual reinvention of his musical ideas as opposed to living off the music he made thirty, forty or even nearly fifty years ago. His recent shows have been colossal productions, possibly some of the largest grossing extravaganzas in rock history, and in unlikely places – Argentina and Turkey, for example – as well as in more familiar cities. In this new invention, of course, he remains a discomforting political activist, speaking to old and new audiences alike. The undisguised honesty sustains a personal story that encompasses Arras and Anzio, and, in some way, was shaped by architecture school.

This honorary degree ceremony, like so many before at AUR, shed a spotlight on the importance of education in the world today. It also emphasized unexpectedly the place of history in a portfolio of popular music that will forever be associated with the great social changes of the baby-boomers from the 1960s through to the end of the cold war."

—Richard Hodges

From www.aur.edu

Roger Waters memorialises his fallen WWII father

Nick Squires in Aprilia
18 Feb 2014


Pink Floyd rock star unveils a memorial to the father he never knew, 70 years after he was killed during a battle between British and German forces south of Rome.

Seventy years to the day after his father was killed in a desperate battle with German troops in Italy, Roger Waters unveiled a memorial in which he paid moving tribute to the man he never knew.

The founder of Pink Floyd was just a baby when his father, Lt Eric Waters, died during the bitter, close-quarters fighting that took place after British and American troops landed at Anzio in Jan 1944 in order to outflank the Germans and liberate Rome.

His unit, Z Company of the 8th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers, was all but wiped out in an aggressive German counter-attack on Feb 18, 1944.

His remains were never found.

The death of his father has haunted the British rock star all his life and inspired many of Pink Floyd's best known songs, including some off the album The Wall.

But as he stood in front of a newly-erected white marble obelisk commemorating his father in the town of Aprilia south of Rome, he finally achieved a degree of closure.

"It is 70 years to the day since my father died here and I have finally come to the end of a journey to discover what really happened to him," the musician and composer said, after placing a wreath of red poppies at the foot of the monument, next to a British steel helmet peppered with shrapnel holes, retrieved from the battle field.

Waters, 70, said that at the outbreak of the Second World War his father had declared himself a conscientious objector, but as the evils of Nazism became more and more apparent he decided that he should join up.

"So he went back to the conscription board in London and told them he had changed his mind. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Royal Fusiliers, which is how he ended up here 70 years ago. He believed he was involved in a necessary fight against the Nazis, and for that he paid the ultimate price."

Waters said he found the unveiling of the memorial "extremely moving" and at one point had to staunch a nose bleed with tissues.

"I feel an enormous attachment to my father today. I'm very happy to be here," he said, placing his hand over his heart.

Until recently, the guitarist had no idea exactly how or where his father had died.

He knew only that he had been killed following the landings, when tens of thousands of Allied troops streamed ashore at Anzio and Nettuno and established a precarious bridgehead.

But last year his story was taken up by Harry Shindler, an Anzio veteran who lives in Italy and who is head of the Italy Star Association of British veterans.

He scoured war diaries and military maps held by what is now the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers at the Tower of London, and came upon an intelligence report that described the desperate last few hours of Lt Waters' unit and the exact spot where he was killed.

Mr Shindler, 93, who on Wednesday will be awarded an MBE by the British ambassador in Rome in recognition of his services to veterans, has since become friends with Waters.

"Roger, I hope that you can go into calmer waters now and that this wall at least is down for you," Mr Shindler, who also served with the Royal Fusiliers, said.

On Monday the two men paid a private visit to another recently-built memorial, a circular stone monument which marks the spot where Lt Waters died, close to a gully that British troops called "the Wadi".

Although the death of his father caused him huge pain during his life, he seems to have found some peace with the enemy soldiers who killed him.

The monument, which lies on the edge of a grove of olive trees, is inscribed with words from 'Two Suns in the Sunset', the closing track on the Pink Floyd album The Final Cut: "Ashes and diamonds/Foe and friend/We were all equal in the end."

Waters was flanked by two soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, who flew out from the UK to take part in the commemoration.

"In the regiment we have a saying - 'once a fusilier, always a fusilier' - so we feel it's very important for serving members to attend events like this," said Major Chris Head, who was a platoon commander in Z Company, just like Waters' father.

Colonel Duncan Venn, the British military attaché in Rome, said: "It must be very difficult for the relatives of soldiers whose remains were never found because they have no focus for their grieving. Hopefully these monuments will offer some comfort to Roger Waters."

From telegraph.co.uk

Comune di Anzio - Cittadinanza Onoraria a Roger Waters

Roger Waters approva il progetto del monumento ad Aprilia in memoria del padre

Stefano Cortelletti | gen 15, 2014

Il monumento commemorativo, un obelisco marmoreo alto 3 metri, ha già avuto l’ok da Roger Waters, leader incontrastato dei Pink Floyd, e dal suo direttore artistico Sean Evans. Sarà il regalo che il Comune di Aprilia farà al cantante inglese, il cui papà morì durante gli aspri combattimenti a seguito dello sbarco di Anzio il 18 febbraio 1944. Il sottotenente Eric Fletcher Waters perse la vita nella zona di via Riserva Nuova, il suo corpo non è stato mai ritrovato. Questa storia è nota solo da qualche mese e Waters, che non ha mai conosciuto il papà, dopo avergli reso omaggio con innumerevoli canzoni ora viene a celebrarne la memoria nella città in cui perse la vita.

70 anni dopo la morte del papà, il 18 febbraio 2014 Roger Waters verrà ad Aprilia ed incontrerà l’Amministrazione e gli studenti degli istituti Rosselli e Meucci. Poi andrà ad Anzio per ricevere la cittadinanza onoraria.

Il progetto dell’obelisco è stato realizzato da uno studio grafico di Ascoli Piceno, dove risiede Harry Shindler, 93enne inglese reduce dello Sbarco che ha contatti diretti con Waters.

Sulla lapide si legge: In memoria di Eric Fletcher Waters (12 dicembre 1914 – 18 febbraio 1944) morto qui, e di tutti gli altri rimasti senza sepoltura”. Infine, una frase di Roger Waters presa dal brano “Two suns in the sunset” (l’album è The Final Cut dei Pink Floyd): “Cenere e diamanti, nemici e amici, siamo tutti uguali nel momento della fine”.

From h24notizie.com

Roger Waters Interview - BBC Radio 4 (2010)

When Pink Floyd star Roger Waters was five months old, his father was killed in the Second World War.

Years later as Roger enjoyed amazing success, he was haunted by a recurring dream about murdering someone, which he only began to understand when he was much older.

Roger Waters was talking to Kirsty Young on Desert Island Discs broadcast on Sunday 29 May 2010 at 1115 BST on BBC Radio 4, repeated 0900 BST on Friday 3 June 2010.

Roger Waters - We Shall Overcome

"Over the new year 2009-2010, an international group of 1500 men and women from 42 nations went to Egypt to join a Freedom March to Gaza. They did this to protest the current blockade of Gaza. To protest the fact that the people of Gaza live in a virtual prison. To protest the fact that a year after the terror attack by Israeli armed forces destroyed most of their homes, hospitals, schools, and other public buildings, they have no possibility to rebuild because their borders are closed. The would be Freedom Marchers wanted to peacefully draw attention to the predicament of the Palestinian population of Gaza. The Egyptian government, (funded to the tune of $2.1 billion a year, by us, the US tax payers), would not allow the marchers to approach Gaza. How lame is that? And how predictable! I live in the USA and during this time Dec 25th 2009-Jan3rd 2010 I saw no reference to Gaza or the Freedom March or the multi national protesters gathered there. Anyway I was moved, in the circumstances, to record a new version of " We shall overcome". It seems appropriate."  
                                                                    Roger Waters




We shall overcome
We shall overcome
We shall overcome some day
Deep in my heart
I do believe
That we shall overcome
Some day

And we'll walk hand in hand
we'll walk hand in hand
we'll walk hand in hand one day
Deep in my heart
I do believe
That we'll walk hand in hand
One day

And we'll break down the prison walls
We will tear down those prison walls
Together we will tear down the prison walls on that day
Deep in my heart
I do believe
That we will tear down all those prison walls
On that day

Deep in my heart
I do believe
That we will tear down those prison walls
On that day

And the truth will set us free
The truth will set us free
The truth will set us all free
On that day

And deep in my heart
I do believe
That the truth will set us all free
And we shall overcome
On that day

Merry Christmas everyone!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 Feliz Navidad y Feliz Ano Nuevo!

 Joyeux Noël et nouvelle année heureuse!

 Glad jul och lyckligt nytt ar !

 Frohe Weihnachten und glückliches Neues Jahr!

 Spokojnych Świąt Bożego Narodzenia oraz Szczęśliwego Nowego Roku!

Roger Waters - Keynote Q&A at Billboard Touring Conference 2013

Waters talks with Billboard's Ray Waddell about Pink Floyd's first U.S. gig, the music business today and the monumental success of The Wall tour.

Roger Waters Stand Up For Heroes 2013

"Roger Waters and more paid tribute to the sacrifices of our military members at The Bob Woodruff Foundation and New York Comedy Festival Production's "Stand Up for Heroes" benefit at New York City's Madison Square Garden.

Waters performed Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here," accompanied by a group of injured soldiers who are also musicians"