REVIEW: Barbara Dickson
REVIEW:
Barbara Dickson
Eden Court, Inverness
* * * *
by Margaret Chrystall
AT the start of her song-packed concert at Eden Court on Friday Barbara Dickson reckoned it could be 20 years since she had last played the theatre on a solo tour.
“It must have been something I said,” she joked. “But thanks for forgiving me!”
As the receptive crowd greeted each song with the kind of applause and cheering usually reserved for a favourite encore, it was clear the singer had been away too long for many.
An evening topped and tailed by Gerry Rafferty songs – The Royal Mile to The Ark – Barbara has done an album of his songs – was packed with the kind of variety few others could muster.
But the singer’s career spanning folk, musical theatre and pop meant the night included some of her songs from the musicals – Another Suitcase In Another Hall and Blood Brothers' Easy Terms; pop career – January February and Caravans; love for folk and ballads – The Laird Of The Dainty Dounby, Lady Franklin’s Lament, Barbara Allan and King Orfeo; her own self-penned song – Where Shadows Meet The Light, and covers of songs by James Taylor and George Harrison.
Barbara had warned at the start that she had picked up flu – “Bear with me”. But the only flaw seemed to be was one missing note in Another Suitcase which, when it came round again in the song, she simply sang it an octave lower.
Chatty with lots of information about the songs, Barbara quickly paid tribute to her occasional band (they meet to play every two years) – Troy Donockley, Nick Holland, Brad Lang and Russell Field – whose arrangements, variety of instruments and voices, added a rainbow of different colours and textures to each song. Troy also treated us to a weird-looking white plastic instrument sounding like a violin called the Artiphon.
But premier instrument of the night was Dickson's own simmering caramel voice.
