WHEN he recorded his musical version of The War of the Worlds in 1978, Jeff Wayne did not even know that it would get released let alone spawn a live show that still fills arenas today.

Speaking to Vibe, Jeff, 70, said: “I had no expectations. When I composed and produced it, my contract with CBS didn’t have any guarantee that they had to release the record.

“When I finished it they had a right to listen to it for 30 days and make a decision if they liked it enough.

“The 30 days came and went and I got call asking if they could have another 30 days, so it was a rather tense time.

“Add to that, their investment was a third of what the album cost so as a family we had our life savings on the line.”

The New Yorker said he musician friends thought he was “bonkers” for pursuing the prog rock epic, which featured the likes of Richard Burton, David Essex and Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott, but for Jeff it was the opportunity of a lifetime so he ploughed on.

The album, a musical interpretation of HG Wells’ classic, was an unequivocal success and 15million records, spending 330 weeks in the UK album chart.

Part of its success was the iconic casting of Richard Burton - a big coup for Jeff.

He said: "I didn’t have a big list in truth but Richard was at the very top of it, for sure.

"It is easy to make a list but the next thing is how do you get to the person? Sometimes it is rather tricky or there are layers of agents and managers and all sorts of people before you get to the person.

"I’ve actually bumped into people, not just actors, but singers and very well-known singers and musicians who I was trying to get to and have been turned down by the agent, to discover they didn’t even know there was an offer.

"It just happened by coincidence or very good fortune, that some friends had just come back from New York and had seen a play called Equus starring Richard Burton.

"I thought at least I know where he is."

Jeff wrote a letter to Burton explaining the project, attached a script and sent it to the stage door.

He said: "I hoped that the manager would handle my package and hoped that Richard would open it, read it, hoped that he would respond to it and hoped it would be a resounding yes.

"There was a lot of hope in there."

But that hope was well-placed.

Jeff said: "It was no more than two or three days after it would have arrived that I had a called from a man called Robert Lance who was Richard’s manager in those days.

"The precise words he said were ‘count him in, dear boy’."

And working with the screen legend was a breeze, Jeff said.

"He was a delight. In the era we’re talking about he had a reputation that preceded him and the truth is I didn’t know which Richard Burton was going to walk through the studio doors," he said.

"The man that arrived was the most prepared, charismatic and great guy to work with. He had a contract with us that gave us up to five days of studio time, 12 hours a day.

"He did it in just under one day."

Last year, he recorded a revamped Next Generation version with a new cast and since 2006 a live version has been touring arenas.

The latest tour – the last planned arena show – comes to the O2 next year on Saturday, December 13.

It features Jason Donovan, Brian McFadden and Liam Neeson in holographic form.

Jeff said: “It’s a combination of quite high-tech and various technological ingredients that appear on the stage, over the audience, around them and combines it with live performance.

“We have a whole cast live on stage singing, with some acting.

“I’m conducting a symphonic string orchestra and a nine piece band, and it’s all integrated with split-second timing to tell the story of The War of the Worlds.

“We have some key iconic ingredients and we have lots of small effects which add up to an unusual marriage between sight and sound for a multimedia interpretation of what was the first science fiction story ever written.”

He added: “Each tour we increase the production values.

“We keep challenging ourselves to top the previous tour and never take it out of the box the same way twice.

“In 2006 we filled six huge trucks, which was considered big, but on our last tour we were up to 12.”

Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of The War of the Worlds is at the O2 arena on December 13, 2014. Go to theo2.co.uk