Journey to the Centre of the Earth (album) earned Wakeman a nomination for an Ivor Novello Award and a Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance. In 1999, Wakeman released a sequel album "Return to the Centre of the Earth". After the original score was presumed lost, Wakeman was reunited with it in 2009 and re-recorded the album three years later with 18 minutes of music previously cut due to time constraints. By mid-1973, Wakeman had been with the progressive rock band Yes for almost two years, and he had released his debut solo effort, "The Six Wives of Henry VIII", to critical acclaim. For his next release
Journey to the Centre of the Earth (album) Wakeman wished to make an album that told a story with its music, something that he had been inspired to do so since his father took him to see a performance of the symphonic fairy tale "Peter and the Wolf" by Sergei Prokofiev which features a narrator telling the story and an orchestra illustrating the action. Wakeman had wanted to do an orchestral rock piece based on the 1864 science fiction novel "Journey to the Centre of the Earth" by Jules Verne as early as November 1971, but he put the project on hold until he had finished recording "The