Jo Harrop: The Heart Wants Tour @ Hoochie Coochie - May 12

Jo Harrop (vocals); Paul Edis (piano); Jihad Darwish (bass); James Kitchman (guitar); Steve Hanley (drums).

We love Jo - she's a singer who's at the top of her game with, maybe goodness knows what else she still has in store for us.

Last night's show at Hoochie was proof of her versatility as the somewhat less than capacity crowd discovered to their audible delight. The majority of the numbers were from her most recent album, The Heart Wants and were, with a couple of exceptions such as Duke's All Too Soon, mainly lyrics by Harrop, music by Edis.

On the album there's a 'cast of thousands' whereas here, it was whittled down to a quartet without losing any impact. The sound wasn't perfect. Too much bass in the first set and too much treble in the second but that, I was told later, could well have been due to where I was sitting as it seemed to be fine elsewhere in the room. Whatever, Jo's voice overrode any such obstacles real or imagined. Is there a better singer around? Maybe, maybe not.

It was good to hear James Kitchman all these years after serving his 'apprenticeship' at the Chilli with Dave Weisser and Take it to the Bridge. Originally from Hexham he'll be gigging at his hometown festival over the weekend as will the rest of the band including Jo.

Any gig that involves Paul Edis whether as a pianist, composer or arranger is going to be good. Tonight he wore all three hats, need I say more?

Steve Hanley pops up quite frequently with various line-ups and slotted in nicely here. His exchange of fours with Jo's scatting on one of the ringers (from a different album) What a Little Moonlight Can do went someway to curing my allergy to that over cooked jazz tradition (fours).

Bassist Jihad Darwish first came to my attention when he appeared here last month with the Jazz Defenders. I was knocked out then and I failed to beat the count again last night. Soloing, supporting or playing rich-toned intros he's your man.

A great gig that should have had them queuing around the block which once again raises the question of the jazz audience's parochialism. I don't know if this is peculiar to the north east but each venue seems to have its own crowd and rarely do the twain meet. If they did, all gigs would, by necessity, take place at The Arena. Let's hope more make the pilgrimage to Hexham Abbey - Lance

The Heart Wants; Everything's Changing; Charade*; What If?; Dangerous Love*; Home*; Hold On; I Think You'd Better go; Rome Wasn't Built in a Day*; What a Little Moonlight Can do*; All Too Soon; Life Inside; Red Mary Janes & a Brand New Hat; If I Knew; Wise Words; Nothing We Can Do*; Guilty*; Fine and Mellow*

* Not from The Heart Wants.