Barbara’s golden voice still attracts the crowd
The latest big star to cause a stir at the Inchyra Arts Club was Barbara Dickson, who closed the current season in fine style last Wednesday.
The evening was opened by the delightful Belfast singer/songwriter Anthony Toner, who quickly won over the appreciative Arts Club audience with his jokes and witty ,intelligent yet poignant songs accompanied by his masterful guitar playing.
His‘Tyrone Gothic’delivered dark tales in a beautifully melancholic setting.
Interspersed with comic but keen observations, his reminiscence of his Alzheimer’s stricken father which inspired‘Alphabet song’struck a chord and reflected the love and respect for his ailing parent.
‘Louise‘ showed off his caustic but carefully targeted wit brilliantly. If or, as I hope, when he returns don’t miss him.
Then came the evening’s main event: Barbara Dickson, accompanying her still golden voice on guitar and piano and assisted by the vocal and keyboard talents of Nick Holland, proceeded to display the immense depths of her ability to stir an audience.
She regards herself as an interpreter of songs rather than a songwriter although amongst
Barbara Dickson others‘The Hill’from her latest EP comfortably displays her talent as a writer.
As the evening wore on her interpretive skills gave us an insight into a wide variety of styles and sources.
Beginning with songs learned in her early days in the Folk Clubs of her native Fife like the perennial ‘Jamie Raeburn’and‘Palace Grand’, an American song acquired from the singing of Jean Redpath.
She moved through some of her major hits from Musical Theatre‘ Another Suitcase in Another Hall’ from Evita and‘Tell Me It’s Not True’ from Blood Brothers and then to material from some of her favourite writers.
The songs of Bob Dylan , Charlie Dore and the much-missed brilliance of Gerry Rafferty , whose songbook made three contributions to the show, culminating in a fabulous version of‘The Ark’.
The wonderful finale saw Anthony Toner return to the stage and together they delivered an astonishingly fine version of Gram Parsons’‘HickoryWind’ before Barbara Dickson ended the show with yet another hit,‘Caravan song’, proving (as if proof were needed) why she remains one of Britain’s best loved performers.
The enthusiastic audience drifted away into the summer gloaming with a sense of warmth inside and out.
The new season at the Inchyra Arts Club opens on Wednesday, October 18 when English singer/ songwriter (and former X Factor contestant) Lucy Spraggan entertains.