The Great Gig in the Sky has gone down in history as one of the greatest and most recognisable songs from Pink Floyd.
But it’s not Roger Waters or David Gilmour who gave the song its most recognisable moment. Clare Torry, the singer-songwriter who provided the vocal work to The Dark Side of the Moon hit, has become legendary with progressive rock fans. Her staggering vocal performance has been hailed as one of Pink Floyd’s greatest moments, and it was a happenstance request for a “great singer” that landed Torry the job. Alan Parsons was asked by Pink Floyd to find the group a session musician to perform a song which had “no words, no melody line, just a chord sequence.” Torry received just £30 at the time, £400 adjusted to inflation, and would later reflect on the mistake she made in not organising a copyright.
Parsons would share: “They simply said, ‘Who shall we get to sing this?’ And I said, ‘Well, I know a great singer.’ I just knew her through one album of hit cover versions she’d done – you know, the cover albums that proliferated in the early 1970s.
“They were always done in a day. And I was very impressed with her. There was a bit of direction given; they said, ‘Sorry, we’ve got no words, no melody line, just a chord sequence – just see what you can do with it.’
“She was only there for a couple of hours. As I remember, she did two or three tracks, from which we assembled the best bits for a master version, but somewhere in the archives are the bits we didn’t use, and I’m sure it would make for an interesting remix version one day.”
Torry, in 1998, would say she wished she had protected her work on the song to earn more money from it. She shared: “If I’d known then what I know now, I would have done something about organising copyright or publishing.” In 2005, Torry would reach an out-of-court settlement in her favour, though specifics were never disclosed.
All releases of The Dark Side of the Moon now carry a “vocal composition” credit for Torry, who did go on to work with Waters on his solo albums, When the Wind Blows and Radio K.A.O.S. Torry would also perform The Great Gig in the Sky with Pink Floyd, minus Waters, in 1990.
Waters would praise Torry’s work on the album, saying: “Alan had worked with her previously, so we gave her try. And she was fantastic. We had to encourage her a little bit, we gave her some dynamic hints: ‘Maybe you’d like to do this piece quietly, and this piece louder.’”
In recent years, Torry has collaborated with John Fyffe and received a BASCA Gold Badge Award, in 2011 and 2010 respectively. Torry also released Heaven in the Sky, a collection of her early recordings from the 1960s and 1970s.
