Akkerman talks about the album

David Bowie on the night in question

For the recently published Box Set of Akkerman albums Jan has commented on each of the albums for a booklet that accompanies the 26 discs. On Tabernakel he has written

This album proved a great opportunity. Producer Geoffrey Haslam introduced me to arranger George Flynn insisting "Jan, he's your man". Thanks to Atlantic boss Ahmet Ertugun, engineer Gene Les Paul (son of) and the New York Philharmonic came on board. We made the album in a week.(1)  From my perspective, new instruments such as Moog synthesizers (2) in the seventies marked a musical renaissance. I wanted to connect the modern with traditional lute music and that was the general philosophy behind Tabernakel. Once I'd discovered old Mediaeval lute material and Julian Bream's work (3), I immediately went to Cambridge University to make photocopies of the tablatures (4). I only found out later that I could have bought them at Schott's music on Great Marlborough Street in London! (5) At the time I couldn't incorporate any lute playing in Focus so I recorded it for my third solo record instead. To record the lute, Gene plastered the instrument with so many Barcus Berry pick-ups (6) (purchased at Mannys in NYC (7)) that consequently it looked like a hospital patient! I knew Tim Bogert and Carmine Appice from Vanilla Fudge (8) and they were great guys to record with and understood exactly how I wanted to do things.

House of the King was done on the Coral electric sitar, (9) an instrument I discovered in the States in early 1973, and I use a genuine sitar on the record

Javeh, (10) the Jewish name for the Lord, came to me while staring upon the wide landscape of Friesland where I was living at the time. The piece starts a little restlessly but turns into an impressionistic and calm piece. In February 1974, I wanted to perform Javeh at the prestigious Grand Gala du Disque (the Dutch equivalent of the grammys) (11) and invited George Flynn to assist the orchestra with the arrangements. The performance, which was performed live on television, didn't go to plan and I decided to play solo. After the first few bars, I felt uncomfortable and decided to walk away. This happened in front of David Bowie and other celebrities (12), but I've never regretted it for a moment.

(1) Sounds like a slight exaggeration but maybe not

(2) See Wikipedia article on the Moog here

(3) See Wikipedia on Julian Bream here

(4) These days the tablatures from Cambridge are online. See here.

(5) See here

(6) In 1963, experiments initiated by violinist John Berry and electronics visionary Les Barcus, gave birth to the first ever piezo crystal transducer for musical instruments. Many further innovations have been made since. For more, see here.

(7) There from 1935-2009. See this Wikipedia article here.

(8) See Wikipedia article here

(9) See an article on the Coral here

(10) See Wikipedia article here

(11) The event on Friday February 15 was the last time the event was televised. For details of the many others performing that day see here.

(12) David Bowie is not listed above but he is mentioned here on Wikipedia.

Bearded men

The original album cover boasted these four bearded images featuring

Gene Paul Geoffrey Haslam (both pics David Gahr)

Ray Lucas (pic by Kathy Moore) George Flynn
(Akkerman was also bearded at the time)

Engineers

The engineers on the album were Gene Paul and Joel Kerr, still at work today. (The assistant was Stephen Dowd, son of the legendary Tom Dowd).

Gene William Paul (born August 20, 1944) is an American audio recording / mixing / mastering engineer, producer and musician. He was an engineer at Atlantic Recording Studios during their famed 1960s–80s period and is currently the chief mastering engineer at G&J Audio, a mixing and mastering studio for major and independent labels focused on reissues and new recordings. He has worked on thousands of projects, and has engineered 9 Grammy Award-winning albums with 29 total nominations in 15 different categories. He has engineered many hit recordings, including 7 #1's on the Billboard Pop & Jazz charts, 6 more in the Pop Top 10, 10 more in the Jazz Top 10 and 5 in the R&B Top 20.
Son of famed guitarist and inventor Les Paul, the inventor of the solid-body electric guitar and early innovator of multitrack recording, Gene Paul spent his youth developing his engineering skills in the family recording studio and spent a decade as the drummer in his father's touring band from 1959 to 1969, with singer Mary Ford (his stepmother) for the first half. "Without even knowing it, I was being taught about presenting music, which was a great experience. I worked on putting the shows together with dad. I watched him record his own music as well as groups. If he said, 'Do you want to know about this?' I'd say, 'Yes.' And I'd go set up a mike. By the time I grew up, I knew how to record."
His career took off after joining Atlantic Records in 1969 where he quickly became a world-renowned engineer and producer. "The people there, like Tom Dowd, Arif Mardin, Joel Dorn, Ahmet Ertegun, they were all gentle people. You would think that they were all superstars, but they never acted that way. Being at Atlantic was like being welcomed into someone's house. It was a house of music. You never knew who was going to come in, one day Aretha [Franklin], the next The Modern Jazz Quartet, King Curtis, Gladys Knight. ... It was truthfully hard to go home at night."

Joel and Gene

Joel Kerr is the founder and studio manager for G&J Audio (formerly DB Plus) from 1987. He envisioned a studio that was ‘musician friendly’, where the artist’s music came first and based on his belief that professional audio services shouldn't cost the farm. It’s a formula that worked for over 30 years. A trumpet player in his youth, Joel ventured into the music world more than 45 years ago as an audio engineer at Atlantic Recording Studios. He has worked with legendary producers Nesuhi and Ahmet Ertegun, Jerry Wexler & Arif Mardin and with artists including King Curtis, Steve Goodman, Cissy Houston & The Sweet Inspirations, Gary Burton, Cornell Dupree, David Newman, Jerry Stiller & Anne Meara, Black Heat, Cactus, Hall & Oates, Danny O’Keefe, Donny Hathaway, Neil Rosengarden, Maggie Bell, Barnaby Bye, Margie Joseph, Herbie Mann, Sam Samudio, Les McCann, Oscar Brown Jr, Marion Williams, Doug Sahm, John Prine, Ramatam, Mongo Santamaria, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Chris Brubeck and New Heavenly Blue, Yusef Lateef, Carly Simon, Aretha Franklin, Bette Midler, Keith Jarrett, Eddie Harris and Maxi Priest.