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| (© Jerry E) |
Billed as Pannonica, the two sets actually comprised a delightfully varied selection from three of Zoë’s albums with five Monk tunes, four by Tom Harrell and two originals from her Twelve Stories album. In addition we had four standards and two out of left field – Leon Russell’s Song for You and Paul Simon’s Graceland (of which, more later). Zoë might, justifiably, claim a greater share of the “original” content since she penned all the lyrics for the Tom Harrell based Aurora album.
The opener, Blue Monk, set the standard for the evening with attention-grabbing solos from both instrumentalists and Zoë’s characteristic dramatic “performance” of the lyrics – I have commented before on the fact that she never simply sings a song, rather she interprets it and conveys to the audience her sense of its mood and meaning. The third important element, for me, in the musical enjoyment of the evening emerged in the original composition, In it Together – namely scat. Scat is a bit like Marmite – people tend either to love it, or hate it. I’m in the love it camp (for both things)! It is arguably the most extraordinary form of improvisation as the human voice is capable of more variation than any single instrument invented by man.
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| (© Jerry E) |
Zoë does
scat really well and with infinite variety to suit each song. On the Harrell inspired Shadowed in Solitude, deep, low notes alongside
bowed bass contributed to a haunting, melancholy mood. On a cracking, up-tempo In Walked Bud, we had a scat intro followed by much
vocal gymnastics. The quintessentially Monk Straight, No Chaser featured vocal sounds to match
his often startling music – sounds ranging from pin-sharp soprano monosyllables
(probably capable of communicating with bats) to warm gurglings like the
crooning of a chain-smoking contra-bass pigeon! Not content with
vocal sounds, on the Harrell based Ebb and Flow Zoë used, and closed the number with, clicking
sounds produced by tongue, teeth and the roof of the mouth. Bubbling water,
perhaps – extraordinary, certainly!
The standards were not delivered as standard: Do Nothing Till You Hear From Me was “a raunchy rhumba for a Brampton Saturday night”; Caravan, minus drums, was interestingly different; You Turned the Tables on Me featured scat, a bass solo which got whoops! from the audience and Paul Edis managing to quote Anything Goes in his excellent solo, and West Coast Blues (sorry, if this is miscategorized as a standard) ended with Zoë improvising lyrics about how far people had come to attend the gig (the furthest being from Sydney!).
Leon Russell, whose beautiful Song for You was flagged up as a favourite by Zoë, was a name which had never registered with me but it has now! What a biography – producer on River Deep, Mountain High, writer of Delta Lady, 60 years of performing across a range of genres and a collaboration album with lifelong fan, Elton John, in 2010! The other left field number – a stripped down voice and bass version of Graceland was an absolute gem, highlighting the fact that Zoë is not all about vocal fireworks, her singing here being “stripped down,” too. Highlighting, also, how accomplished a bass player Andy Champion is: you wonder how two people can re-interpret something as complex as this pop classic but, if the bass riff is there and the vocals are right, it is (I repeat) an absolute gem!
And finally, the venue, which was new to me: Zoë dubbed it “the Ronnie Scott’s of Brampton” – a bit of poetic licence, maybe, but it was very good indeed! The auditorium, set out in lounge-style, held the 80+ audience in comfort with a good view of the performers for everyone. The sound was spot-on and there was good food and drink available from when the doors opened. Real ale at £3.50 and a good selection of hot food from £5 can’t be bad! Cumbria may sound like a far-off place but it’s only about 40 minutes by car from the Toon – you really should try it! Jerry
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