Van Dyke Parks: return of a musical maverick

He tried in vain to move the Beach Boys away from surf and bikinis. Today artists from Rufus Wainwright to the Scissor Sisters are queuing up to work with himAs the small, white-haired, bespectacled man in a sleeveless cardigan took his seat a few rows from the front of the stalls in London's Royal Festival Hall one night in 2004, several dozen people among the already packed house greeted him with a standing ovation. Those who did not recognise the seemingly insignificant figure were soon appri...

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