Renaissance was a 1970s progressive rock band.
Former members of The Yardbirds Paul Samwell-Smith, Keith Relf and Jim McCarty organised a new group devoted to experimentation between rock, folk, and classical forms. This quintet ( bassist Louis Cenammo, pianist John Hawken, and Relf's sister Jane as an additional vocalist) released a pair of albums on Elektra, but dissolved quickly, leaving McCarty to reform the band into a very different lineup, though McCarty also soon departed.
This new lineup, probably the best-known of the band's history, consisted of Annie Haslam ( vocals), Michael Dunford ( acoustic guitar), John Tout ( piano), Jon Camp ( bass) and Terry Sullivan ( drums). Along with Rob Hendry ( electric guitar), this quintet released Prologue in 1972. The music was written primarily by Dunford and McCarty, with lyrics by poet Betty Thatcher. Hendry departed as the group turned away from the electric guitar in their music.
In the 1970s, Renaissance had a commercially successful career, their sound similar in many ways to folk rock with classical overtones. However, Renaissance's performances were normally faithful reproductions of the studio recordings, and this was not taken well by fans.
Renaissance scored a hit single in 1978 with Northern Lights, taken from the album A Song for All Seasons, but the band floundered following 1979's Azure D'or, as fans were unhappy with the band's turn towards synthesizers, a path followed by most progressive rock bands at one time or another. Camp had assumed more of the band's songwriting, and Tout and Sullivan left. Haslam, Dunford and Camp released a pair of albums in the 1980s and then broke up. Their albums were not available on CD for some time, though a pair of compilations were issued in 1990. During the 1990s, though, much of their catalog was released.
