In a new interview with Legendary Rock Interviews, guitarist ULI JON ROTH talks about his 40th Anniversary Tour, Sky Academy, JIMI HENDRIX and much more. An excerpt follows:

Q: You are set to see us all here in the United States again for this upcoming 40th anniversary tour celebrating the original SCORPIONS material. How are you feeling about that?

A: "It’s something I’m really looking forward to for a number of reasons one of them being that the timing feels so right. Sometimes I’ve done things and I’m thinking, 'Maybe this is not the right thing at the right time' (laughs), but this just feels like it’s all coming together very nicely. I’ve been onstage performing the Scorpions material for the last few years now and that is after not having done that during stretches of my career, whether it was during the Electric Sun days or otherwise. I really wasn’t playing any of that stuff live and I basically didn’t enjoy it as well, my mind had gone to a completely different place. Some years ago, maybe due to popular request or whatever it was I started playing a few of them and initially I didn’t really have the right connection with them. It took me some time to really, really decipher the code. I could play it but I just didn’t feel quite comfortable with it. Then recently, more and more, something has changed and I am really enjoying playing these songs and feeling comfortable with them. It almost feels like I’ve reconnected with something and that’s always interesting you know? To reconnect with that part of my past is interesting and I am taking it really seriously and we are going to be playing a really good cross-section of the stuff from that era that was really my favorite material from the time when I was with the Scorpions. That’s not necessarily just the things that I wrote either, there are some things that Rudolf (Schenker, guitarist) and Klaus (Meine, vocalist) wrote where I just contributed the guitar parts and some of the arrangements. We are going to be playing tracks from each of these five albums and I want to make sure it’s presented as good as it can be so we are bringing a big band with seven people onstage, keyboards, three guitar players and two vocalists. I feel that way we can do justice to the stuff that’s on the albums because on the albums we have lots of multiple guitar parts and I was never satisfied with some of them live before. A song like 'In Trance' has all of these big harmony guitar parts and then live it would always be like the poor man’s version."

Read the full interview here.

Uli Jon Roth will be performing live on NAMM on Saturday (January 26th), at Malone’s in Santa Ana, CA.

“This is going to be an exciting show that Uli Jon Roth fans, Scorpions fans and fans of metal in general will not want to miss”, stated Edward Cieplinski, co-founder of The House Of Metal, the hosts of the event. “We’ve had some amazing shows at our venue, but having a true metal God like Uli Jon Roth grace our stage is truly an honor. Whenever Uli is in town, you never know who is going to show up, and the fact that it’s NAMM weekend makes it that much more exciting."

In addition to this historic night of metal, fans will be a part of a live recording as well as a meet and greet for no additional charge following Uli’s live dedication to his years in the Scorpions. Limited tickets are still available at this location.

Roth recently issued the following update: "Greetings to all of you! I hope you had a great New Year. Here is a condensed list of some of the events that are planned for the first half of this year. 2013 is going to be a very busy and intensely productive year ahead, it seems.

We will start off with a two-day Sky Academy in Los Angeles, at the Santa Monica Playhouse, January 21/22. This is a beautiful, intimate theatre, where we held one of the previous Sky Academies of which we all have fond memories. I’m looking forward to being there again!

On the next day I will take part in JASON BECKER’s Not Dead Yet concert in San Francisco, together with my friends Steve Morse (DEEP PURPLE), Richie Kotzen, Gus G. (OZZY OSBOURNE, FIREWIND, and several other great players. Jason is an inspiration to all of us and I feel honoured to be part of this worth-while cause.

Following that, I shall be attending the Winter NAMM show in Anaheim, California, and will do a signing event for the Sky Guitar Limited Edition at the Dean booth.

At the end of January we are embarking on my extensive 40th Anniversary Tour of the US, which will take us all the way through February until the beginning of March. 2013 marks the 40th anniversary of my involvement with the Scorpions. The main theme of this tour will therefore be dedicated to performing my personal favourites from the five albums which I recorded with that great band.

I have chosen about 30 songs in all from that era as the basis of our repertoire, several of whom have never even been performed live by either the Scorpions or myself. We shall be rotating a selection of these songs on the tour, varying our sets on a nightly basis, because we cannot possibly play all of them in one go.

We will, of course, also play some ELECTRIC SUN and SKY OF AVALON music, but the main theme of the performance will be dedicated to the early Scorpions era.

Every show will be recorded for a live album, which will feature only songs from my time with the Scorpions. This will result in a double CD, which will be mixed in 5.1 surround. The release will also contain a DVD and a documentary, including personal behind-the-scenes Super-8 footage, which I shot to document our tours from 1973-1978.

As far as live albums go, I am intending to record two further ones in the following years: One will be featuring my favourite Electric Sun material -

and the next one will consist of Sky Of Avalon/ Transcendental Sky Guitar music.

In order to do full justice to my selection of Scorpions songs we are bringing a large band with an exciting line-up. Due to the length of the tour, not all members were free to do the whole tour. Therefore some of the positions will be filled by two musicians – each of them playing part of the tour.

The 40th Anniversary US-Tour line-up will be:

Uli Jon Roth: guitars, vocals

Henning Basse: lead vocals

Ali Clinton: guitars, vocals

Niklas Turmann: guitars, lead vocals

Ule W. Ritgen, Elliott Rubinson: - bass

Jamie Little, Peter Holmes: drums

Paul Rahme, Corvin Bahn: keyboards, vocals

In addition to the concerts there are 14 introductorySky Academy Seminars to be held during the course of the tour! These are usually taking place at the venues of the shows, on the same days and prior to the concerts. Pre-booking is essential, though. The seminars are not only geared for musicians. Anyone who loves music can attend. Sky Academy is about much more than just guitar playing, but players are also very welcome to bring their guitars and practice amps. The teaching should be useful to players of all levels.

March, April and May will be dedicated to studio work and some shows in England.

I also have been invited to play at the Royal Albert Hall in London by Alfie Boe as a guest for his concerts in April. Aside from this, we are going to collaborate on a new release of Bridge to Heaven intended for the Sunflower Jam Cancer Charity.

In June we will play six concerts in South America, co-headlining with MCHAEL SCHENKER. The dates will be posted very soon.

We are planning further European and UK dates for the second half of 2013 and a tour of Japan.

All of these will be announced on this website as well as on Facebook.

I am also looking forward to my continued involvement in the ROBERT JOHNSON Award in Hamburg, Germany, which is a great platform for genuine young guitar talents. As a special appreciation of his talent, I have chosen one of last years' participants, the 14-year old Merlin Lauert, to share the stage with us at our Wacken 2013 show.

And last, but not least: I have written an entire album’s worth of new material, which I am very excited about. As soon as time permits we will begin to record it.

Once again, many thanks to all of you and God bless! Have a great 2013!

For more details visit Ulijonroth.com.