Heavenly performance at Church Tour
What do you get when you bring four of New Zealand’s most talented singers and songwriters together?
Well, those at the Chapel of Christ The King next to St Pauls’ Collegiate found out when they were treated to the Hamilton leg of The Church Tour recently.
Sharon O’Neill, Shona Lang, Debbie Harwood and Hammond Gamble have written and performed songs which have made their mark on the musical landscape.
In Hamilton they delivered their well-known hits, some of their personal favourites, mixed in with some new songs and sounds to keep the audience interested.
And although the audience heard from each performer individually, there were also many combo-performances you’ll never see anywhere else. For example Hammond Gamble opened the concert with his edgy, blues/soul voice ripping through the church and was later in the piece joined by Shona Lang, whose bold voice demands attention.
There were other double-team acts as well, when Debbie Harwood and Sharon O’Neill combined voices for songs such as O’Neill’s Asian Paradise and Danced in the Fire. Then there were moments when all four took the width of the church stage to combine their experience and talents.
At the end of the first hour-long set, mother-and-daughter audience groups took the time during a break to look up the performances on their mobile phones, to check their ages and titles of songs.
There was a good mix of ages in the crowd, from people who would have enjoyed the group’s music from the 1970s, 80s and 90s, to younger audiences who came to hear and appreciate four of the big names in New Zealand music.
Debbie Harwood and Sharon O’Neill, in particular, engaged with the audience.
Harwood even admitted recently she had enjoyed happier times in her life and so writing about tragedy was no longer the only source of inspiration.
In the second set of The Church Tour, the audience heard some of the big hits they’d associated with the performances, such as Sharon O’Neill’s Maxine, Shona Lang’s Glad I’m Not A Kennedy and the show finished with Melting Pot, made famous by Debbie Harwood’s When the Cats Away.