Writz and Music

Mark Wirtz (born 1943 in Strasbourg) came to prominence in the British music scene of the sixties as a producer and composer. Working as an in-house producer for EMI from 1967, his biggest success was "Excerpt From A Teenage Opera" a psych-pop epic sung by Keith West, whose band Tomorrow was also produced by Wirtz. A Teenage Opera remained incomplete, but surviving pieces of the project plus contemporaneous productions were compiled and released in 1996. Since 1970 Wirtz has pursued a career in the States as producer, musician, writer and, most recently, comedian. Mark Wirtz is best known to connoisseurs of lounge music for a handful of mid sixties projects for Ember.

The EMI releases were credited to Mood Mosaic and included "A Touch Of Velvet - A Sting Of Brass", which was adopted as theme tune for both Dave Lee Travis's Radio Caroline show and Beat Club on German TV. Wirtz and Music combines two albums recorded for British indie label Ember. Latin A Go-Go was recorded in 1965 with contributions from top session artists Jim Sullivan (guitar), Vick Flick (guitar), Eric Ford (bass guitar), Reg Guest (piano), Dougy Wright (drums) and The Ladybirds (vocals). Released in 1966, original pressings of Latin A Go-Go now change hands for big money and "Watermelon Man" is a club favourite. The all-instrumental Smooth And Easy was originally released in 1966 on Ember's now much sought-after Mood Music Library series.

1967 US releases in "psychedelic" sleeves (with Latin A Go-Go re-titled Wirtz & Music) are also highly collectable. This is the first time Smooth And Easy has been released on CD in its entirety, and the debut of Latin A Go-Go on CD outside of Japan. An illustrated booklet includes notes by Bob Stanley.