Newcastle Community Green Festival; Leazes Park; Sunday June 2

Hannabiell And Midnight Blue

(Review by Ann Alex).

Leazes Park became a mass of people, lots of swirling colourful clothes, Chinese, Italian, Turkish food for sale, holistic healing therapies available, juggling, hula hoops, acrobatics, face-painted children everywhere, and of course lots of publicity for green issues.

On to the stage stepped the band, tension gradually building during the setting up, drums, repeated word riffs, a few whistles, then a drumming call to arms and we’re off, people dancing from the start.  Long pieces, tempo accelerating, volume approaching a climax then, more gently, quietly coming to an end.  You’ll hear sax, bass trombone - sounding wonderfully obscene - pounding drums, guitar, a cheeky whistle to get your attention, powerful riffs, ‘free yourself to my rhythm’ shouts Hannabiell over and over again, and the dancers obey. I notice a child sitting on her mother’s shoulders, drumming the rhythm out on her head.  Poor Mum!  A great session, seriously elemental rhythms.

Baghdaddies come on with a very different rhythm, now we are in the East with sensuous twisty Arabic sounds with a comic touch, and the audience catches on immediately, arms are raised, waved about, twisting hands, and I put down my reviewer’s notepad, can’t resist joining in, so the rest is from memory.  They start with a fun eastern waltz with foreign words which may be a real Eastern language, or not.  They continue with a version of Keep Your Feet Still Geordie Hinny  and then comes Have A Tequila to the tune of Hava Nagila .And there’s the added attraction of a lady (Monica Gracia) in black and red with sequins doing wonderful belly dancing, vibrating and shaking hips.  This is the stuff of harems, where women used to entertain each other with such dancing, which is reckoned to be good exercise in preparation for childbirth.  You learn something all the time from this blog!  Guitars, trumpet, alto sax (Paul Ruddick also played with Hannabiell and a third band that we missed. Three gigs in one day!), congas and drums all manage to fit in effective solos among the fun and dancing and the two encores are well deserved.  They end with Show Me The Way To Go Home, so we have to do so, but what a great afternoon of music, food and fun.
Photos.

Ann Alex