Mr Wonderful, Live
advertisment
Related Content
- The Weekend: Live Here (24/09/2009)
- The Weekend: Live in Our World (16/10/2008)
- Men And Women Weren't Meant To Live Together (02/09/2007)
- Recession Live Music Sessions (08/03/2009)
- The Delta Spirit Live at the ICA (14/04/2009)
It's a Bank Holiday Monday evening and the Barbican Hall is jumping. People screaming, stomping their feet, clapping their hands, attempting to one last time lure their idol back on to the stage - but to no avail. And yet only happy faces exit the hall. They had been fed well enough by Mr Wonderful.
If this doesn’t ring a bell for you then you are definitely not Italian, unlike no doubt most of the adoring crowd at the Paolo Conte concert. I have never been enveloped in such a fragrant audience either - delicious and very reminiscent of the evening passeggiata in any Italian town. His song about 'wonderful' - probably the only English word spoken all evening - provoked screams of delight instantly.
It was Paolo Conte's first gig in five years. He entered just like a certain other septuagenarian, leisurely, full of ease, a man at peace with himself. This simplicity and sincerity links Leonard Cohen and Paolo, as his fans call him. But this crumpled old gent, without the chic make-over Cohen has had, rambled in wearing shabby black clothes. So un-Italian. And then he proceeded to bark syllables into the mike, not sentimental melodies, indeed not Italian at all (as we know Italians). He was a man bearing his soul but not selling it.
He is a man who truly loves jazz, and his amazingly versatile band pays fantastic testimony to that. I have rarely seen so many people playing so many different instruments in one gig and creating so many different sound worlds. We visited New Orleans, New York, Gypsy camps, and heard Klezmer, Piazzolla, Django Reinhardt. And he does cool too, Paolo. A solo - just by him and his gruff, strong voice - is enough to make your hair stand on end. Wonderful, wonderful!
And when he sings (well, sort of sings) it is the essence of Old European culture, text and music interwoven creatively to evoke worlds we only dream of - and some we may wish to forget - nightmares of relationships gone wrong, lives lived badly. The loneliness of the man who tells us "I came to play, to love" in that gritty, rough voice with a lop-sided smile on his very furrowed face, that is what a continental chansonnier used to be.
Where are the George Moustakis, Serge Reggianis, Leo Ferres, Charles Aznavours and Yves Montands of today? We know we are not going to see the likes of them again. And so we hung onto Paolo’s every syllable, and yes, it was wonderful. Wonderful!
- The Southbank Gourmande
It was Paolo Conte's first gig in five years. He entered just like a certain other septuagenarian, leisurely, full of ease, a man at peace with himself. This simplicity and sincerity links Leonard Cohen and Paolo, as his fans call him. But this crumpled old gent, without the chic make-over Cohen has had, rambled in wearing shabby black clothes. So un-Italian. And then he proceeded to bark syllables into the mike, not sentimental melodies, indeed not Italian at all (as we know Italians). He was a man bearing his soul but not selling it.
He is a man who truly loves jazz, and his amazingly versatile band pays fantastic testimony to that. I have rarely seen so many people playing so many different instruments in one gig and creating so many different sound worlds. We visited New Orleans, New York, Gypsy camps, and heard Klezmer, Piazzolla, Django Reinhardt. And he does cool too, Paolo. A solo - just by him and his gruff, strong voice - is enough to make your hair stand on end. Wonderful, wonderful!
And when he sings (well, sort of sings) it is the essence of Old European culture, text and music interwoven creatively to evoke worlds we only dream of - and some we may wish to forget - nightmares of relationships gone wrong, lives lived badly. The loneliness of the man who tells us "I came to play, to love" in that gritty, rough voice with a lop-sided smile on his very furrowed face, that is what a continental chansonnier used to be.
Where are the George Moustakis, Serge Reggianis, Leo Ferres, Charles Aznavours and Yves Montands of today? We know we are not going to see the likes of them again. And so we hung onto Paolo’s every syllable, and yes, it was wonderful. Wonderful!
- The Southbank Gourmande
