The sassy ladies of Cupcake Burlesque battle the manly bears of Hurly Burly Burlesque.. YOU decide who’s champion!

…Cupcake Burlesque…
http://cupcakeburlesque.com/

…Hurly Burly Burlesque…
https://www.facebook.com/HurlyBurlyBurlesque

Musical Guests:

..The Dewars..
https://www.facebook.com/thedewars

..Good Graeff..
www.facebook.com/GoodGraeff

Doors @ 9pm/ 1st band @ 9:30pm / Competition starts @ 10pm/ 2nd band following competition

$10 cover/21+ to enter/ FREE PARKING (lot in rear of bldg)

*5 Points Lounge is located in the KREEPY TIKI plaza on US-1 just South of SR-84 on the East side of the street*

Or view Facebook Event Page HERE

From 8pm, up-and-coming, local and downright hilarious comedienne Vikki Stone will be taking to the stage with her keyboard to deliver some absolutely incredible songs.  Emerging on to the comedy scene after declaring her love for Philip Schofield on Youtube, this witty, amazing talent is not to be missed!  Here she is below doing a one woman les Miserables!

Join us at The Barrels on Saturday 11 May from 8pm and prepare to be #Courtlaughing!

Whilst at The Barrels, be sure to indulge in Wye Valley Brewery’s latest tasty keg of special #Courtlaughing brew, Dorothy Goodbody’s Barrel of Laughs.

Look on the beer’s pump clips to discover how you could have our crowds laughing out loud.  Think you’re a budding comedian?  Then get a pint pulled and make sure you join in this summer’s festivities.

And she nailed it! Supove – who is always great fun to watch, opening the show decked out all in white with a white piano along with watery film projections – began by negotiating her way through the rain-drenched, hauntingly immersive, deceptively minimalist funhouse mirrors of Joan LaBarbara’s Storefront Diva: A Dreamscape. Inspired by Joseph Cornell’s dreams of Debussy playing in a storefront window, it was like being transported to a sonic Cornell box. Supove chose her spots  As much fun as this was to witness, it would be fantastic to hear on album (reputedly there’s a DVD in the works). There’s a visual aspect that gives Supove – a very physical performer, albeit a lithe, graceful one – lots of room for balletesque movement. Throughout LaBarbara’s otherworldly, Lynchian resonances, Supove played Lynch Girl at the keys to the hilt, exchanging melodies between hands whether or not she was playing them. The surrealism of it all hit hard, a hurricane tableau as seen from a safe interior, resonantly comforting despite itself.

Annie Gosfield’s Shattered Apparitions of the Western Wind – like all of the pieces on the program, a new commision from Supove, this being an update on Debussy’s What the West Wind Saw – seemingly illustrated a triumphant human spirit in the face of cruel distractions. Ostensibly, the sound collage that Supove played against reimagined Debussy fragments along with samples from Hurricane Sandy. Aside from a gusty, swooping interlude late in the piece, it was hard to tell what was organic and what was machine-made. Perhaps that was intentional. Throughout it all, beauty triumphed amid chaos, Beatles quotes and endless, hypnotic circularity.

Up to this point, Supove hadn’t been able to indulge in much humor (give her an inch and she”ll take a mile or two: she can be hilarious). So it was fun to watch her tackle her longtime Dr. Nerve  art-rock bandmate Nick Didkovsky’s Triumph of Innocence, a sarcastic title if there ever was one. Supove played hypnotic, distantly Indian-tinged cascades and circular motives while narrating fragments from a Bette Page memoir, actress Georgia Ximenes Lifsher acting out the stripper’s deadpan, seemingly innocent recollections of Estes Kefauver’s foreshadowing of the Meese Commission, Page’s fondness for her photographer/pimp Irving Klaw (what a name, huh?) and her terror of growing old and losing her looks. As it crescendoed, Supove’s breathless narration channeled an increasing violence to match her rapidfire work on the keys. It was enough to make you forget that there was, at least ostensibly, a stripper onstage, no mean feat. Tickets for this explosive and entertaining show are still available as of now. Supove also books the intriguing, vastly cross-pollinational annual Music with a View series here: watch this space for a series of June concerts that promise to match  this kind of excitement.

Pixillation project done by TAG students

All this and a bit of a break from dance performances myself, have led me to get quite excited about our upcoming season of dance here at The Courtyard. We’ve a pretty mixed programme and there should be something for everyone – those seeking superior symbolism, those who want to get to grips with the community experience of sharing dance and those with a bit of curiosity who just fancy trying it out. Well, if you’re one of the latter, this season is the time to break out of whatever shackles are holding you back – there’s going to be something that takes your fancy.

Rosie Kay Dance Company

If you like your contemporary dance uncompromising and brutally symbolic, then make your way to see ‘There Is Hope’ by the Rosie Kay Dance Company (Fri 3 May). Visceral and demanding, it’s contemporary dance at it’s most confrontational and experimental and brings a world of darkness and retribution to the stage. Powerfully choreographed, it’s the sort of show that will knock you sideways and entice you to ask some of the big questions, about life and death and survival.

Following this hell-for-leather introduction to The Courtyard dance season, we’ll be striding on with a physically-charged series of episodes from the Verve 13 (Tue 14 May). James Wilton, Sadler’s Wells Global Dance Contest winner, combines movement from modern contemporary with martial arts and capoeira; Ben Wright warms the heart with music and comedy; with further choreographers creating a fresh mix of interesting technical pieces and dynamic passion.

Verve Dance Company

Nestled into the summer calendar, Courtyard residents 2Faced Dance Company bring forth their Youth Summer Platforms in the form of Fresh 2013 (20 + 21 June), a fabulous collaboration that creates opportunities for primary, secondary and FE college students to share their dance skills with the community. Showcasing break, street, contemporary and fusion performances, this is the perfect warm-up to 2Faced’s evening Youth Dance Company urban and contemporary performance, ‘The Calling’.

With an explosion of dance, music, live vocals, percussion and powerful, folkloric contemporary movement, Jugni will come storming in like a whirlwind of rhythm, motion and rhyme (4 July). Bring on this revolutionary, new take on Kathak dance choreographed and musically realised by Sonia and Sarvar Sabri. Striking and colourful with enchanting vocals, this promises to be a show the like of which you’ve never seen before.

Sonia Sabri Company

And the icing on this dance-laden cake, comes in the form of ‘Express Yourself’ brought to us by the Hereford Academy of Dance (20 July); a fabulous showcase of passionate dance brought to you by local students and raising money for the Little Princess Trust, great dance with a feel-good factor.

So whether your interest is passing or fervently passionate, try out a dance show or two at The Courtyard. We’re even offering a ‘Buy One Get One Free’ offer on ‘There is Hope’, ‘Verve 13′ and ‘Jugni’ so it’s never been easier and cheaper to get your dose of contemporary dance and be awed by some fabulous skills.

For more information and to book tickets call the Box Office on 01432 340555.

Written by Toki Allison

ANTHONY JENKINS

Anthony Jenkins

Anthony Jenkins is not only a stage technician at The Courtyard, but is also a theatre graduate and enthusiast.  Having been affiliated with the organisation for 12 years and performing in past production titles such as ‘The Crucible’, ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’, ‘Dracula’, ‘Fiddler On The Roof’ and ‘Guys and Dolls’, he has seen it all, from musical theatre to psychotic drama, from the lighting desk to the principal role.

After graduating from East 15 Acting School in 2008, Anthony eagerly came back to The Courtyard ready to perform, and took on the role as the giant in Jack and the Beanstalk and has been part of the crew ever since!  Hereford born and bred, Anthony recognises “the Courtyard is a small yet gargantuan step for young performers, who like me, wanted to pursue this amazing subject.”

“I joined the Youth theatre in 2000 and it was great meeting and performing with guys and girls who were on the same page as me, Anthony says.  Whilst being involved in Youth Theatre he claims his favourite performance as “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, without a doubt!  The cast, set, the music, everything was so breathtaking.  I was immensely proud to play ‘Chief’ and to be a part of that show.”

Anthony has not only been a performer in Youth Theatre drama’s and stage adaptations, but has also had his share of tongue-in-cheek Panto performances, including the aforementioned Jack and The Beanstalk, The Emperor of China in Aladdin 2010/11, The Beasts’ double in Beauty and the Beast 2009/10 and The Dragon in Sleeping Beauty 2011/12.  He has also worked first hand on many performances at The Courtyard as part of the stage crew.   His favourite piece to work on , he says, was “the Tommy Cooper tribute show with Clive Mantel as not only was it a brilliant piece, but working alongside such an actor inspired me to pursue my dreams within this field.  It was so good, I almost missed a few cues along the way as I was that enthralled!”

In 2011, Anthony set up his own theatre company called Exit Fool Productions, a move which allowed him to explore his love of theatre and his idolisation of playwrights such as Shakespeare, Waterhouse, Steinbeck and Miller.”  When asked to elaborate on why these playwrights really strike a note, Anthony says it is because “they can switch from comedy to tragedy in the turn of page.  My favourite plays are Jeffrey Barnard is Unwell by Keith Waterhouse and The Crucible by Arthur Miller.”

 On opening in 2011, Exit Fool’s debut production was a UK premiere of Angel: A Nightmare in 2 Acts in The Courtyard’s Studio Theatre.  “I picked this play because it was a piece of writing that had never touched the English shore’s since it was written in 2004.  Even though the content was about the holocaust, which can be quite a heavy subject, I wanted to make the audience feel like they were part of the show by being the jury, and having the characters use direct address to make them feel like they were at the Belsen trials in 1945,” says Anthony.

Anthony is in fact one half of Exit Fool, the other co-founder being friend and schoolmate Pete Bird.  “Pete and I take it in turns to direct, and last year it was his turn for our 2012 production of Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, where I played the lead role of Lennie.  We chose this piece because it is a classic title, and a character driven plot that we felt could reach audiences of all levels and theatre experience, such as schools.  In the end the piece even brought in theatregoers from London!”

Now  Anthony puts all of his experience and inspiration on to paper, as he debut’s his first written piece at The Courtyard’s new theatre writing festival, Write-On.   “For the past two years I’ve been the general technician for The Courtyard’s Write On Festival but this year I’ve decided to write and direct as part of the festival.  Land Of Mines is on the 5^th July and is based on true events during the Bosnian War of 1992.”

The synopsis is as follows:  Set in Sarajevo 1992, four characters are trapped inside a derelict house awaiting rescue from NATO.  The U.N soldier is trying to uphold the peace agreement while the Serbian and Croatian refugees argue and taunt each other as shells constantly fall around them.  Among the refugees is severely wounded Muslim, whose secrets affect everyone around him.  Anthony says “the inspiration behind Land Of Mines came from an acting friend who lived through the war.  The idea of four characters trapped in a dilapidated house came from his personal experience.  The dialog and events that unfold is authentic as I enlisted a relative of mine who was in the British army and worked alongside the U.N at the time who has helped me develop the piece and keep the script as close to the real thing as possible.”

Land of Mines is on in The Courtyard’s Studio Theatre on Friday 5 July from 7.30pm.  It is the second part in a double bill.  To book tickets for this performance, or for more information, contact The Courtyard’s Box Office on 01432 340555.

Interview compiled by Jennifer Booton

But the most gripping pieces on the bill involved multiple instruments. Waldo described Okada as someone whose music manages to be both “tonal, but fresh and new,” and he’s right on the money. An all-too-brief single-movement String Quartet No. 1 , from 2009, blended a poignant sense of longing into stately baroque counterpoint, shifted to an animated, suspensefully bustling atmosphere and then a warmly dreamy song without words. Violinists Yijia Zhang and Jacqueline Jove joined Waldo and violist Rose Hashimoto for a precise yet lush interpretation.

The other real stunner on the bill was Okada’s Piano Trio No. 1, Waldo and Zhang teaming up with pianist Alyona Aksyonova. Uncluttered and brightly lyrical, it was the only work on the bill where the Kyoto-born Okada referenced any Asian tonalities, and even here she cached them within a thicket of western chromatics. Graceful exchanges of voices throughout a strong, cinematic theme led to marvelously stilletto, spacious piano motives, a quick upward sweep and a sudden ending. All together, this was a tantalizing introduction to a composer whose distinctive, colorful voice is making a strong contribution to new music in New York.

As a bonus, it turns out that Hashimoto has a side gig as a pastry chef. Her hand-dipped chocolate cookies are delicious.

Ray Wang, CEO & Principal Analyst of Constellation Research, Inc., will be addressing the Social Business Forum 2013

SOCIAL BUSINESS FORUM 2013

12-13 June 2013
Marriott Hotel, Via Washington 66, MILANO 

www.socialbusinessforum.com

Now in its sixth year, the Social Business Forum organized by OpenKnowledge has firmly established itself as the leading European event for social enterprise, digital marketing and collaborative innovation. 

Get a new perspective on how to open your business up and take full advantage of social media and collaborative technology; find out what strategic opportunities are available; and discover the enormous added value that Social Business is creating for industry and commercial enterprises around the globe . With Keynote Speakers, top industry managers, successful case histories and workshops you can’t afford to miss, the Social Business Forum offers you a unique overview of how the business world is transforming itself in the 21st century.

What’s on offer?

With more than 150 international speakers and 60 successful case histories, the Social Business Forum has welcomed 3600 participants in its six-year history. In addition to the presentations, workshops and Expo area, the Forum is the ultimate networking experience for anyone who wants to make quality contacts with the major players in the social business world. The event offers a unique mix of success stories and intervention models with a focus on business improvement through better engagement with employees, customers, partners and suppliers. The Social Business Forum combines inspiration, ideas and practical examples that will help your business become social.

Highlights

The Social Business Forum 2013 features:

• Keynote Speakers from around the world 
• Premium and Open Conferences
• Case studies and themed workshops
• Real-time translation in both English and Italian
• Dozens of companies sharing their experiences and success stories
• Expo Area, showcasing the most innovative Social Business solutions

Great Speakers

Among the speakers who have already confirmed they will be attending are:

• Michael Brito (SVP, Social Business Strategy at Edelman Digital)
• Sandy Carter (IBM Vice President – Author of “Get Bold”)
• Brett King (Bestselling Author, American Banker BTN’s Innovator of the Year)
• Jacob Morgan (Author of “The Collaborative Enterprise”)
• Sameer Patel (General Manager Enterprise Social & Collaborative Software – SAP)
• Larry Prusak (IBM Institute for Knowledge Management IKM)
• Ray Wang (CEO at Constellation Research)
• George Siemens (TEKRI at Athabasca University, Canada)
• Luis Suarez (Community Builder & Social Computing Evangelist at IBM)

Cutting-edge Themes

The themes for the Social Business Forum 2013 include:

• Customer Engagement
• Social Commerce
• Predictive ROI – Effectiveness of Social Business
• Integrating Collaboration & Processes
• Social Support, Customer Service and Social CRM
• Social Media Marketing, Strategy and Governance
• Social Business Intelligence and Insights
• Collaborative Innovation & Crowdsourcing
• Employee Communities
• Social Intranet
• Open Management and Leadership Models
• Social Learning
• Organizational Network Analysis
• HR 2.0 and Organization Evolution
• Digital Transformation
• Gamification
• Big Data & Social Analytics

Don’t miss out!

SIGN UP NOW! We have a limited-time special offer that includes the price of the FULL Conference (Free + Premium) for just 250€!!!

(offer subject to available capacity)

Visit the Social Business Forum website for full information.

Riverstone is an official Marketing Service Partner of the Social Business Forum.
Find out more…

Every year the Social Business Forum attracts top-name speakers, blue chip companies, executives and consultants.

Now in its sixth year, the Social Business Forum has welcomed 3600 participants and attracted over 150 top-name speakers. The Forum allows businesses to get a new perspective on all aspects of making business more social, new ways of organising work and the strategic opportunities on offer from this radical new business paradigm. With great keynote speakers, top industry managers, successful case histories and dedicated workshops, the Social Business Forum 2013 is a great way to get yourself up to speed on all the latest developments in this area.

And there are still tickets available! Visit the Social Business Forum website for further details.

Please visit this page regularly for news and updates on the Social Business Forum from Riverstone.

First on the bill was Mieczyslaw Weinberg’s Piano Quintet, Op. 18. The Polish composer had an extraordinarily prolific career as both a concert pianist and composer in the former Soviet Union, supporting himself mainly by writing scores for film and animation. He had musical roots: his mother was a pianist and his father ran Warsaw’s Jewish theatre. Both were murdered in the Holocaust. The cinematic aspect of Weinberg’s compositions is potently foreshadowed in this work, witten in 1944 when he was 25. It’s essentially a narrative about a cabaret gone horribly wrong. Its phantasmagorical menace, savage irony and gallows humor may reflect both Weinberg’s dread concerning the fate of his family, and also a contempt for the low-rent theatre types of his new digs in Tashkent, a safe if backwater haven where he ran the local opera company until the war’s end.

The piece has three main themes. Pianist Timothy Andres led the distantly macabre, title theme of sorts with a moody, nonchalant foreshadowing, setting up the series of twisted, tumbling circus interludes, the frantic horror of a couple of chase scenes and the funereal bell motif that eventually serves as its coda. In between there were twisted waltzes, a bit of a lurid stripper vamp and sarcasm in abundance, their edgy counterpoint delivered dynamically by violinists Ben Russell and Caroline Shaw, violist Nadia Sirota and cellist Clarice Jensen.

Henryk Gorecki’s String Quartet No. 3, a 1992 Kronos Quartet commission, was next, quite the contrast with the savagery that preceded it. Taking its inspiration from an elegaic poem by Velimir Khlebnikov, it juxtaposes grief-stricken cumulo-nimbus ambience with a hushed, prayerful theme. Jensen probed sharply for plaintive tonalities and struck gold, Sirota bringing a similarly cello-like richness to the raw, austere passages where Gorecki spotlights the viola.

That Shostakovich’s 1944 Piano Trio No. 2 in E Minor, Op. 67 was almost an anticlimax speaks to the power of what preceded it. And this is Shostakovich at his most savage: the piece introduces a wounded klezmer melody that would reappear in his String Quartet No. 8, as well as a mincing, cowardly caricature in the warped, marionettish closing danse macabe. The composer never alluded to exactly who its target was: it could be Hitler, but it could also be Stalin. Pretty much every classical ensemble not specifically dedicated to a particular era claim to be advocates for new music, but ACME really walk the walk. That this adventurous collective would go as far back in time for this particular program is unusual; that they’d advocate so powerfully for the underrated Weinberg, and go as deeply into the rest of the program as they did is characteristic.

Chinese star Ayi Jihu to present award at Native American Music Awards

Chinese Star Ayi Jihu continues to etch her mark on history by being the first Chinese  artist to be invited to present an award at the NAMA Awards (Native American Music Awards) at Seneca Casino & Hotel in Niagara Falls on May 10th 2013.

The Native American Music Awards represents the Native American Community and their music which prides itself on it’s traditions and cultures and keeping them intact. Ayi Jihu will accompany Top Native American Haida Singer Terri Lynn who is herself up for several Awards this year.

Top Native American Haida singer Terri Lynn

Both Terri Lynn and Ayi Jihu are styled by Top Native Designer Angela DeMontigny.  Both Terri Lynn and Ayi Jihu will be wearing brand new Angela DeMontigny Designs and Angela will be accompanying Ayi Jihu and Terri Lynn on stage at the awards.

Top Native Fashion Designer and stylist Angela DeMontigny

Angela DeMontigny’s Designs and fashions are worn by many top Native and non Native stars around the world.  Ayi Jihu will be in Canada collaborating with and promoting the Brand New Angela DeMontigny (Ayi Jihu) inspired Young Native Fashion Collection, which will be seen for the first time at special events in May and June and which has been causing quite a fuss around the world in Fashion circles, leading to Angela DeMontigny and Ayi Jihu been asked to showcase  Young Native in Myanmar (first fashion week) later this year.  Angela DeMontigny is also the Fashion Designer behind the brand new FearChaser® Costume to be used on the Ayi Jihu FearChaser® film starting production late 2013. The brand new FearChaser® costume will be revealed in full to the world for the first time during Ayi’s tour of Toronto during Chinese Heritage Month (of May). FearChaser® has strong Native Indian influences.

Ayi Jihu has been working with the Native American Indian community in various ways for some time building up firm relationships within the Native Indian community.  This is all part of the Ayi Jihu and Shlepp Entertainment Ltd Strategy of going right to the roots of things in culture, music and art.  Ayi Jihu does not just talk about ‘keeping it real’, She is trying hard to live it.

Ayi Jihu with prominent Native Indian American leader Three Feathers in Palm Springs.

Ayi Jihu is also hoping to take her FearChaser anti-bullying message back into schools on this trip continuing where she left of the last time she was in Canada.  Angela DeMontigny will be joining Ayi Jihu on this short school tour in an effort to help inspire and teach the kids positive ways to express themselves through Fashion and music as well as how to cope and deal with Cyber bullying and intimidation, something she and her own kids have experienced being Native American.

We spoke breifly to Ayi on the phone and she told us she is ‘humbled and honored to be invited to the NAMA awards and want’s to do her best to represent her own Native Yi people of China well’.  She also told us she is ‘very excited at the prospect of perhaps working with Terri Lynn’.  She said the two had ‘discussed some sort of musical collaboration’.  Ayi also stated she is ‘excited about her Toronto tour in Asian Heritage week and is looking forward to doing lots of positive things in the great city of Toronto as well as working with the kids again’.

Global News shall be covering the Ayi Jihu tour of Toronto with Anglea DeMontigny, including their appearance at the Native American Music Awards, with Terri Lynn and all the other amazing projects, Tv and press and music they will be undertaking.  We shall bring you the news here first.

To find out more about the Native American Music Awards visit their website.

Find out more about Top Native recording artist Terri Lynn visit her website here

Find out more about Top Native Fashion Designer and Stylist Angela DeMontigny and Young Native Fashion.

Find out more about Chinese rising star Ayi Jihu

Watch the brand new Ayi Jihu promo video and listen to the new single It’s Magic.

Follow us @globalnewsink

4/25/13     Bruce Robison & Kelly Willis

4/23/13     The Mavericks    Cannery Ballroom

4/25/13     Abigail Washburn     The Franklin Theatre

4/25/13     Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis      3rd and Lindsley

4/25/13     Shooter Jennings     Marathon Music Works

4/27/13     The KDSML Review      Exit/In

4/28/13     Kim Richey with Maia Sharp     3rd and Lindsley

5/4/13      Space Capone and Guilty Pleasures     Cannery Ballroom

5/7/13-6/2/13 Lion King     TPAC

5/10/13     Gabe Dixon     3rd and Lindsley

5/12/13     The Killers     Grand Ole Opry House

5/17/13     Brandi Carlile with the Nashville Symphony     Schermerhorn

5/18/13     The Avett Brothers     Bridgestone Arena

5/20-21/13     Sheryl Crow     Franklin Theatre

5/25/13     Abigail Washburn Franklin Theatre

6/9/13     Dawes     Ryman Auditorium

6/13/13      She & Him     Ryman Auditorium

6/14/13     Billy Joe Shaver

6/22/13     Los Lobos, Los Lonely Boys, Alejandro Escovedo

6/28/13     Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture

9/25/13     Mavis Staples & Blind Boys of Alabama

The first set was swing shuffles. It was practically comedic to watch Elliott (ringleader of Mostly Other People Do the Killing, arguably New York’s most entertaining live band) walking the bass tirelessly: it was obvious that he couldn’t wait to leave the rails. When he did, it was usually to run permutations on clenched-teeth, percussively circular riffage. While there ws a sextet onstage, the moments when the whole unit was playing were mostly limited to intros and outros, much of the soloing supported simply by bass and drums, Kanelos holding back to a spare, spacious, sostenuto suspense. As Murray swayed and built from a sputter of sparks to a fullscale wail, Elliott’s fingers became a blur of roaring, tremoloing chords, enhanced by the room’s natural reverb. When the song came back to Lundbom – playing a Telecaster through a Fender amp – he took his time, letting the sonics echo for all they were worth.

Kanelos shadowed Lundbom’s murky, enigmatically insistent single-note runs over swirling snowstorm cymbals as the opening number went on, Irabagon taking over the center, nonchalantly holding it together as the rhythm loosened. Lundbom has a kinetic, spring-loaded stage presence, opening the second number with a long solo, working tensely against a central tone, Kanelos echoing that device a little later on with an aching intensity before leaping into unexpectedly purist blues, the band joining him in a split second. Good jokes abounded: Irabagon falling into a deadpan bup-bup-bup until Lundbom finally stepped all over it and wiped the slate clean; Murray and Irabagon playing good cop vs. bad cop on the second of three Lundbom arrangements of old wiccan songs until both horns decided to make a mockery of the blues. The last of the wiccan songs was the only one that the band allowed to go on long enough to reveal its origins as a sad folk tune in waltz time. Ultimately, they made their own sorcery out of it. If the second set was anything like the first, it’s a good thing they got this whole thing in the can.

Far from a household name, his most famous composition, performed by The Brothers Johnson “Strawberry letter 23″ was a huge hit. You know it. Maybe not by name, but you know it. Hell, it was used in a Special K Strawberry ad a few years back!

Do yourself a favour, pick up Inspiration/Information/Wings of Love, which features several unreleased studio tracks. It’s full of some of the most soulful, funky, beautiful guitar work you’ll ever hear this side of Minneapolis. He doesn’t showboat and go off on Santana-type solos. The entire album is an organic, spiritual experience, if I may be so cliche. It was such a rare treat to see a phenomenal artist who’s spent so much time out of the limelight to reap the rewards of his legacy.

Eric & Shuggie Otis

As usual we grabbed a bit of video footage – so you can have a peek at what you missed, or re-live the evening if you were!

We have lots more great acts coming on Tuesdays – next week we have ‘Blue Reed’ – a great guitar/vocal duo – well worth a watch!

Before that on Sunday at 7.45pm we have the ‘Book Group Blues’ – a Cabaret written specially by the Suite Semi-Grand team!