These days it's not often I float home on a cloud after a gig - but tonight was one of them.
Was it Jazz? Who cares? I've given up on pigeon-holing. If it hits the spot it will do for me.
I'd read of their success at the London and Edinburgh Jazz Festivals so I figured this was going to be something else - AND IT WAS!
The Creole Choir of Cuba (6 women 4 men) although singing almost entirely in Creole - Cuba's second language - the ten performers had no difficulty in communicating with a sold out Hall 2.
The first set centered around the earthquake and the resulting cholera epidemic that devastated Haiti. One of the songs was so emotive I felt the tears forming.
This wasn't just music it was theatre it was dance it was grand opera over a salsa beat.
I needed a drink! A glass of medium white in the company of Mo (Scott) and Rod (Sinclair) brought me down to earth - at least for a while. They too dug it.
If I thought the first set had been something the second one knocked me for six - no make that ten - make it a million!
The harmonies, the choreography, the voices - Havana meets Covent Garden! The one concession to our native tongue was an almost barbershop rendition of Unforgettable - it certainly was!
On the movers the audience clapped, they stamped their feet and when the excitement got too much one girl got up and boogied up on to the stage - the choir, the audience and the girl loved it!
By the end I was wondering if I was going to have a heart attack! And there wasn't an instrument on stage apart from a couple of congas! So much for the power and versatility of the vox humana.
At the end it was a standing ovation and the band encored and exited through the audience singing and shaking hands.
Was this the best gig ever?
Maybe not but it's certainly high on the list!
Catch them even if you have to swim to Cuba!
Lance.
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