[5] Following their world tour supporting Brain Salad Surgery (1973), the group took an extended break before they reconvened in 1976 to record a new album.

1, Greg Lake wrote several songs with lyricist Peter Sinfield, and Carl Palmer recorded tracks of varied musical styles.

The group track "Fanfare for the Common Man", Emerson's adaptation of the 1942 composition by Aaron Copland, was released as a single in May 1977.

In August 1974, Emerson, Lake & Palmer finished their ten-month world tour in support of their fourth album, Brain Salad Surgery (1973).

This was followed by the triple live album Welcome Back, My Friends, to the Show That Never Ends ～ Ladies and Gentlemen (1974) which earned the group their highest charting position in the US with a peak of No.

Keith Emerson said that at this point in their career, the group's musical direction had been "milked dry" and they wanted to spend time planning their next step.

[6] Lyricist Pete Sinfield has claimed credit for the album's title, explaining, "I suppose if you're gonna be pretentious, you might as well do it big.

Emerson performs on a Steinway grand piano with the London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by John Mayer, who assisted on the orchestral arrangements.

Working hard on the score, Emerson looked back on it shortly after the album was released: "I've squeezed every ounce of myself into that thing.

[6] When it came to preparing material for the album, Emerson dedicated a period to "think and write" following his depression after his Sussex home caught fire two years prior, burning his possessions and music he had put down.

[6] In the band's Beyond the Beginning documentary, Lake recalled that Emerson invited composer Leonard Bernstein to listen to the work during his visit to the Paris studio where the recording was being mixed.

The 13-minute "Pirates" originated from a piece Emerson had written for a cancelled film version of Frederick Forsyth's book The Dogs of War.

As a result, Works Volume 1 received mixed-to-poor reviews and is often viewed as marking the start of an artistic downturn in the group's career, despite the great success of "Fanfare for the Common Man" as a single.

They also criticize the solo sides of Keith Emerson ("on the level of a good music-student piece, without much original language") and Greg Lake ("'C'est la Vie', the featured single, says little that 'Still...You Turn Me On', from their previous album, didn't say better and shorter").

"[15] Paul Stump's 1997 History of Progressive Rock characterized the album as excessive, indulgent, and "clodhoppingly stereotypical", but also asserted that it "is not without merit".