Jon Anderson and Paul Green's School of Rock perform "Leave It"

[Mr. Holland]

Well, I never thought I'd ever hear this song live again, and truly live at that! But here it is:

[Davy]

Wow, now that's thinking outside the box!

[Gilly Goodness]

Jon seems to be mimicin' Trevor. His voice a tad lower.
Funky almost Talkin' Heads vibe. Prog DooWop! 😛

[downbyariver]

Wow.

They seem to have pulled this off without obvious use of a backing track and without eliminating or dramatically simplifying the main aspect of the song for which they would need a backing track. Even when Yes did this song live, which may have only been on the 90125 tour, a prerecorded backing track was clearly in use for some of the layered harmonies.

It helps, of course, that the Paul Green folks have a seemingly unlimited number of people to pull on stage when needed, but there are some professional rock bands that travel with several touring musicians (Some musical acts even have like a trio of harmony singers they travel with who only do harmonies.). Yes could probably do this song in this manner (i.e. No backing tracks or dramatic changes to the song) if they had perhaps two extra (good) vocalists (For a total of five singers- Davison, Sherwood, Howe, and the hypothetical extras.). I wonder if the late 90s lineups that featured Anderson, Squire, Howe, and Sherwood would have been enough. My guess is even they might have needed one more, but I don't have a great feel for the logistics of music.

I was sort of impressed in an odd way that Anderson seemed to get out of the way and just play tambourine and join in with the backing vocals. Sometimes the phone video person would focus on Jon because his lips were moving, but it was clearly the kids doing the leads on all the words that were out front.

This song actually was, as Jon notes, a big hit for Yes, with a very memorable music video and everything. Yet, like a lot of the material from that era, it's been ignored by Yes and bands with former Yes members that play or played Yes music. It's good to see someone doing it on stage (via the Internet).

This wasn't necessarily exactly the same, but the way it's laid out is as close to the studio version as one is likely going to achieve in a live setting.

[Ceasar’s Palace]

I don’t quite know what to make of these videos. It’s fun and you get to hear unusual songs, but Jon is sort of a guest in his own legacy, and it’s almost John High School Musical or something. Curious thing.