Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page has broken one of his fingers, forcing promoters to reschedule the concert that will see his first public musical encounter with both John Paul Jones and Robert Plant in 19 years.
The concert, originally scheduled for Nov. 26, will be postponed exactly two weeks to take place Dec. 10.
If Page can go three weeks without playing guitar, it would allow his finger ample time to recover, an unnamed specialist said in the official press release announcing the rescheduling."I am disappointed that we are forced to postpone the concert by two weeks," Page said in the statement. "However, Led Zeppelin have always set very high standards for ourselves, and we feel that this postponement will enable my injury to properly heal, and permit us to perform at the level that both the band and our fans have always been accustomed to."
The statement said Page sustained the injury over the weekend. News of his fracture was kept silent until the replacement date could be announced.
Ticketmaster is being asked to contact its customers by Nov. 8, informing them of the schedule change and the actions necessary to obtain a refund should they be unable to attend on the new date. They would have until Nov. 14 to apply for a full refund of their purchase.
Any tickets made available as a result of refunds will be offered to ballot winners selected at random from original registrations after Nov. 15.
While the nature of Page's broken finger has not been publicly disclosed, it marks the second time the guitarist has accidentally broken a finger prior to a concert date with Led Zeppelin.
In 1975, while exiting a train on his way to a rehearsal in England, Page broke the ring finger of his left hand. He described it at the time as being "the most important finger for a guitarist ... the one that does all the leverage and most of the work."
Unable to play with that particular finger, he improvised what he called "a three-fingered technique" and went on tour without canceling any dates.
"We almost canceled the tour, but we couldn't, as we'd sold all the tickets, and a postponement would have meant chaos," he told Lisa Robinson in 1975.
Page also joked that he was trying to master this alternate technique "so that whenever there's another accident, which I'm bound to have at the beginning of an important tour, I'll be ready for it."
Over the ensuing 32 years, he may have changed his mind about that. Page may have decided over time that insisting on playing that North American tour in 1975 as planned may not have been the best move for his hand.
An instrumental on John Paul Jones's 1999 solo album Zooma is called "B. Fingers." The first letter stands for "Broken" because, he said, the main riff is "extremely difficult to play."
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Jimmy Page delivered a statement to Led Zeppelin ticketholders this morning:
"As you all know by now I was regrettably put in a situation where I had to postpone my performance at the Ahmet Ertegun Benefit show, on November 26th, due to a fractured finger. We have now rescheduled this show to take place, at the same venue, on December 10th. In doing so I was very conscious of the fact that many people are travelling great distances to attend. I do want to let everyone know that this decision was unavoidable. My apologies to anyone who has been inconvenienced by this change.
"I would also like to thank everyone else involved for their help with making this change. Harvey Goldsmith, the trustees of the Ahmet Ertegun Foundation and, of course, the other artists who so willingly agreed to join us on the show. I look forward to the 10th December!"
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