Adriana Varela | The Auditorium, Rome | 6 September, 2008

Whilst every local and national news station in Italy seemed to have joined the stampede to catch a few seconds of footage of Madonna at the Olympic Stadium last night, at the Auditorium Music Park world famous Argentine tango singer Adriana Varela inaugurated the second edition of the Buenos Aires Tango festival with a stunning show in Sala Sinopoli.

The festival - sponsored by the Ministry of Culture of the Government of the City of Buenos Aires - is a two week celebration of tango in all its forms with a series of concerts and events introducing tango musicians, singers and dancers to a wider audience. Before the concert I was unfamiliar with Adriana Varela's music and I'd bought the tickets on the recommendation of a tango-loving friend - but I left the show a fan, entirely captivated by her extraordinary voice and charismatic personality! Prowling up and down the stage talking to the audience, sitting on occasions, combining elements of cabaret with tango-as-torch-song drama and even squeezing in a glamorous costume change at one point (during which her band - Marcelo Macri on piano, Ernesto Molina on accordion and Horacio Avilano on guitar - treated us to an instrumental interlude) this felt like an intimate nightclub show performed by a major talent. I was on my feet with the rest of the audience who gave her a standing ovation and was rewarded by a surprise second encore after the lights were up. One of the highlights of the show for me was Con la frente marchita (see video below).

Stepping outside after the concert into a still stiflingly warm summer evening, the Argentine atmosphere continued with dozens of couples tangoing in the Cavea which had been transformed into an impromptu open air dance hall for the occasion.

Buenos Aires Tango runs until 18 September.

Lucilla Galeazzi and Fabrizio De Rossi Re | Villa Doria Pamphilj, Rome | 28 June, 2008

Monday evening saw the closing concert in the series Concerti nel Parco in the wonderful setting of Villa Doria Pamphilj, the largest of Rome's public parks. The Umbrian singer Lucilla Galeazzi and the Roman singer and jazz pianist Fabrizio De Rossi Re both perform traditional Italian folk songs and this evening saw them revisit some classics in surprising and entertaining ways in a performance entitled Canti tra cielo e terra (Songs between Land and Sky).

I'm a huge fan of Lucilla Galeazzi and try to see her whenever she plays in Rome but thoroughly enjoyed De Rossi Re's exhilarating jazz reworking of some numbers, in particular the two songs which opened the show La storia di Isabella di Lorena and La mamma del mio amore and a duet with Giuppi Paone Mamma mia mi voi maridà.

From the second she stepped on stage, however, it was clear from the cheers from the audience, that most people were there to see the immensely talented folk icon Lucilla Galeazzi who, once again, gave an impeccable performance and literally stole the show with her incredible voice and charismatic presence. The set show stopper for me was the Luigi Tenco song Mi Sono Innamorato Di Te.

Björk | The Auditorium, Rome | 25 July, 2008

Bjork
Originally uploaded by Maria Novella

Of the entire summer calendar of events in Rome this year this concert was the one I'd been looking forward to most eagerly...Björk last toured in Italy seven years ago so her appearance at the Cavea at the Auditorium on Friday evening was a major event. And what a spectacular show it was! The Volta Tour is a visually thrilling experience with the set draped in flags and medieval style pennants and a series of special effects throughout – explosions, lasers, strobes and a huge swirling snow storm of ticker tape in the finale – but at its heart there is the music of Björk and her extraordinary voice. She was proceeded on stage by the marvellous all-singing, all-dancing (and all-woman) brass band The Wonderbrass and then rushed out to ecstatic cheers and launched into Earth Intruders from Volta. From the first few bars it was clear that she was in stunning voice and this was confirmed as she then sang Unravel and the rapturously received Hunter.

An added instrumental bonus which served as a brief intermission of sorts was the Overture from Selma Songs, the soundtrack to Dancer in the Dark which was played by The Wonderbrass before Björk joined them again on stage to perform the oldest of the tracks that evening, Anchor Song from her first album Debut.

The Cavea is an intimate venue seating only 2000 people and concert goers tend to stay seated longer there than they maybe would anywhere else, and certainly the over zealous security guards often try to stop any keen fans from nearing the stage, so it was down to Björk herself to get everybody up on their feet – You're too polite! Stand up! she cried - and stand we did and those lucky enough to be sitting in the stalls could at last rush the stage! During Hyperballad too she encouraged the audience to sing along saying We are in Italy! closing the show with a frenetic Pluto which the audience kept on chanting throughout the applause till she reappeared for the Volta Tour anthem Declare Independence – Roma, Raise your Flag! An unforgettable evening.

Full set list:
Intro
Earth Intruders
Unravel
Hunter
Pleasure is All Mine
Desired Constellation
Hidden Place
Jóga
Overture
Anchor Song
Army of Me
Triumph of a Heart
Wanderlust
Vökuró
Hyperballad
Pluto
---
Declare Independence

Sigur Rós | The Auditorium, Rome | 12 July, 2008

Sigur Rós
Originally uploaded by fanny_

From the moment that Icelandic band Sigur Rós walked on stage and the opening notes of Svefn-G-Englar floated into the air above the Auditorium in Rome last night it seemed that more so perhaps than any other performer I've seen play there, here was a band whose music seemed made to be heard in that venue with its perfect acoustics. For those of you who have never been there, Renzo Piano's extraordinary design houses the three main theatres in insect-like pods so the whole effect is part organic, part other worldly, with those pods grouped around an open-air amphitheatre – the Cavea. Even the simple yet ethereal stage design set seemed perfectly attuned to the setting – a series of balloons hung like seven moons at the back of the stage.

A sell out concert - less fortunate fans were sitting just outside the entrance to listen - this was a stunning spectacle in every way. The four men moved around the stage playing glockenspiels to keyboards to percussion, as well as the electric guitar played with a cello bow, and were joined by an all woman string quartet and five piece brass band (who first marched on stage in a wonderful moment of showmanship as an interlude during Se Lest) with Jónsi Birgisson's extraordinary falsetto being the glue which somehow held the eclectic musical strands together into a wonderful whole.

When the audience were invited to get to their feet and clap during the pre-encore finale Gobbledigook I honestly believe that every single person was out of their seat and clapping and stamping their feet – and continued applauding till the band reappeared for a stunning encore closing the show with Popplagið (Untitled 8) – and then we applauded even louder and longer till the entire cast of players reappeared and took their bows. And yet after two hours of music the audience still wanted more and weren't happy till Sigur Rós came out one more time to take yet another curtain call. Unmissable.

Mercedes Sosa | The Auditorium, Rome | 9 July, 2008

Mercedes Sosa at the Auditorium, Rome
on 9th July 2008
Originally uploaded by Deborah Swain

Every now and again a concert is more than just a concert...it's an event that one feels privileged to have been there to witness. Wednesday night at the Auditorium in Rome was one of those special evenings when the Argentine singer - and certainly in Latin America, living legend - Mercedes Sosa performed in the open air Cavea at the Auditorium. The concert coincided with the singer's 73rd birthday and she seemed delighted by the spontaneous chorus of Happy Birthday in a mixture of Spanish and Italian from the enthusiastic crowd as she slowly came on stage and settled into an armchair. She then held court for over two hours singing the traditional Latin American songs she is most famous for (Todo Cambia was stunning) as well as tracks from her most recent album, the Latin Grammy Award-winning Corazón libre, accompanied on occasions by the numerous guests who joined her on stage to perform some of the songs - Franco Luciani on harmonica was astounding!

At the finale of the concert she removed the red shawl which she had worn throughout the evening and was helped to her feet to sing the Argentine National Anthem - Himno Nacional Argentino - for 9th July is also Argentine Independence Day.

Alanis Morissette | The Auditorium, Rome | 24 June 2008

The annual season of open air music events during July in the Cavea at the Auditorium Music Park - Luglio Suona Bene - got off to a wonderful start on Tuesday evening with a sellout concert by Alanis Morissette.

The atmosphere was incredible and the enthusiasm, (word perfect) singing along and spontaneous shouted declarations of adoration were rewarded with a blistering performance of classics from her multi-Grammy winning back catalogue as well as a smattering of tracks from her latest album Flavors Of Entanglement.

Alanis Morissette has an incredibly charismatic stage presence - in fact she seemed determined to connect with each and every member of the audience regardless of where they were sitting in the Cavea, rushing backing and forth across the stage with dynamism in between bouts of headbanging! And on a personal note - I'm a sucker for girls with guitars who play the harmonica! In the words of the song which closed the concert Thank You Alanis for a wonderful evening!

Full setlist (with thanks to Italian fan site AlanisMorissette.it )

Moratorium I
Uninvited
All I Really Want
Eight Easy Steps
Perfect
Citizen of the Planet
Underneath (Piano Solo)
Incomplete
Versions of Violence
That Particular Time
Hand in My Pocket
Moratorium II
You Oughta Know
Tapes
Head Over Feet
You Learn
Ironic
Thank You

An Evening with EELS | The Auditorium, Rome | 8 March, 2008

EelsYellow
Originally uploaded by fasterwallace

It's not often that one goes to a concert and instead of a support band the lights go down and the audience is treated to a BBC documentary about quantum physics! However, the acclaimed Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives film about Eels front man Mark Oliver Everett and his relationship with his father, Hugh Everett III originator of the many-worlds theory of quantum physics , proved to be the perfect introduction to what was going to be an intimate Evening with Eels – after all, Mark Oliver Everett or 'E' has always used his music to process the family tragedies that have beset him over the years. What was surprising, perhaps, was just how warm and funny he was during the show, interspersing the heartbreaking intensity of the songs with mocking self irony – at one point he read his own fan mail and rave reviews. He was accompanied on stage by Jeffrey 'The Chet' Lyster , who switched with remarkable dexterity between drums, guitars and the musical saw (which sounded very much like a theremin) and also read excerpts from E's recent bestselling autobiography Things the Grandchildren Should Know. I've read recent reviews of this tour that described their on stage relationship as symbiotic – certainly their blistering Flyswatter in which they swapped back and forth between the piano and drums whilst never dropping a beat was an astounding feat of both musicianship and showmanship!

For an Eels fan it would be difficult to pick a best bit in what was quite simply a perfect evening which showcased the very best of E's song writing with the man, incidentally, also in excellent voice. The event was only slightly marred by the lack of an encore – after five minutes of applause, foot stamping in anticipation of a return to the stage by E and the Chet the lights in Sala Sinopoli suddenly came back on to an audible gasp of disappointment from the audience. Fan forums are abuzz with inside information that blame the Auditorium for curtailing the show because of time constraints... leaving us wondering which additional couple of numbers would have been added to the twenty song set list.

The full set list as follows – (thanks to Altoclef at Estranged Friends, an Eels fan forum.)
Grace Kelly Blues
It's A Motherfucker
Strawberry Blonde
The Last Time We Spoke
After The Operation
Souljacker, Pt. I
Elizabeth On The Bathroom Floor
Climbing To The Moon
My Beloved Monster
I Like Birds
(Fan mail readings and concert reviews spoken interlude)
(Chet reading excerpt from E's autobiography about meeting Angie Dickinson)
Jeannie's Diary
The Sound Of Fear
(Chet reading a further excerpt from E's autobiography about his neighbor seeing his sister's ghost)
Last Stop This Town
I Want To Protect You
Flyswatter
Bus Stop Boxer
Novocaine For The Soul
Good Times, Bad Times (Led Zeppelin cover)
Somebody Loves You
Souljacker, Pt. II

Lang Lang | The Auditorium, Rome | 25 January, 2008

There was something rather appropriate about Chinese pianist Lang Lang opening his concert on Friday night in the Santa Cecilia concert hall at the Auditorium in Rome with Mozart's Sonata K. 333; at twenty-five Lang Lang could almost be considered a veteran having given his first performance, like Mozart himself, as a child prodigy of five! The adult Lang Lang now tours the world promoting the piano and classical music - indeed, he is so passionate about the need to introduce children as early as possible to the benefits of musical tuition that he has been made a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations' Children's Fund (UNICEF).

Lang Lang excites praise for his thrilling virtuoso performances wherever he plays, along with some criticism for his flamboyant showmanship which is frowned upon in some stuffier classical music quarters! However, for me his stage presence makes Lang Lang all the more an exciting and charismatic player to watch...at one part during Schumann's Fantasia op. 17 it almost looked like he might stand up and smash the Steinway to pieces ala Hendrix or Townshend with their guitars!

Prior to opening the second half with a wonderful set of six traditional Chinese pieces transcribed for the piano (featured on his Dragon Songs CD), Lang Lang introduced and explained each song in a brief presentation in English, indulging the Italian audience with a buonasera and grazie! He then went on to play a piece from Goyescas by Granados, Liszt's transcription of The Death of Isolde from Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, ending with Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No.6, treating us to a surprise encore of Chopin after numerous curtain calls and rapturous applause. And yet there was more to come – after almost two hours of extraordinary intensity on stage, Lang Lang then met fans and signed CDs in the bookshop. A superstar – catch him if you can!

Russian Army Ensemble | The Auditorium, Rome | 1 January, 2008

The all singing, all dancing Armata Russa (Russian Army) known as the first peace army launched the 2008 calendar of events at the Auditorium in Rome on New Year's Day when the hundred strong Choir, Ballet and Orchestra of the Russian Army of St. Petersburg’s Military District performed at the Santa Cecilia concert hall. The show alternated between genuinely exciting acrobatic dancing and rousing Russian popular songs.

The Russian Army Choir closed the evening with the world famous Kalinka...and as a special surprise for the Italian audience, Va Pensiero by Giuseppe Verdi!

The clip below is from an earlier appearance this year in Bolzano, Italy.

Ennio Morricone | The Auditorium, Rome | 30 October, 2007

Getting across Rome on a moped to reach the Auditorium on Tuesday evening was a question of picking the right moment and dodging the torrential rain which had been pouring all day. Amazingly, we managed to get there AND back without getting drenched but only just in time. In fact, an impressively noisy and quite spectacular electric storm broke over the Parco della Musica shortly after we arrived, accompanied by another downpour making the lead-coated insect-like roofs on Renzo Piano's buildings gleam and steam like space pods in a sci-fi movie.

This dramatically cinematographic setting seemed very fitting, somehow, for a wonderful concert by the Orchestra and Choir of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia directed by the maestro of film scores, Ennio Morricone, and in particular, his ambitious 2002 piece Voci dal silenzio (for vocal recital, recorded voice, chorus and orchestra); both exhilarating and at times, deeply unsettling, it was composed initially as a response to the September 11, 2001 attacks and subsequently dedicated to the victims of all the massacres throughout history.

After a short interval, Morricone returned to the stage to conduct a series of suites with excerpts from some of his hundreds of film scores, pieces he has tagged applied music as opposed to the absolute music of his concert pieces.

1st suite – Per le antiche scale, from the 1975 movie by Marco Bolognini;
Bugsy, directed by Barry Levinson, 1991;
H2S by Roberto Faenza, 1969.

2nd suite – City of Joy, from the 1992 movie by Roland Joffé;
Nostromo, from the TV series directed by Alastair Reid, 1996.

3rd suite – The new composition Sicilo e altri frammenti, inspired by the ancient Greek Epitaffio di Sicilo, thought to be one of earliest ever examples of musical notation.

4th suite – The Mission, once again directed by Roland Joffé in 1986.

The concert ended to rapturous applause after the extraordinary crescendo of the Mission suite. The maestro was called back several times for encores which included the song that has been playing in my head ever since – Here's to You (aka The Ballad of Nick & Bart) dedicated to the memory of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti from the film Sacco e Vanzetti.

Joanna Newsom | Circolo degli Artisti, Rome | 23 September 2007

Earlier this year I watched in despair as tickets to see Joanna Newsom at the Barbican in London quite literally disappeared before my very eyes on the on line bookings page of the Barbican Website. By the time I'd checked out flight times and the viability of flying over to the UK all the best seats seemed to have gone! Fast forward to Sunday evening here in Rome and the incredible opportunity to see Joanna Newsom in an intimate, albeit packed-to-capacity, venue in San Giovanni – the Circolo degli Artisti, a place famed for its support of emerging and less mainstream artists.

JOANNA NEWSOM
@ circolo degli artisti, roma
(23rd Sep 07)
Originally uploaded by studio koku

Very occasionally a concert is more than simply a good or even great concert – sometimes there is something so unique about the artist or a particular performance that you suddenly become aware that you're witnessing an unmissable event by a performer at the peak of their creative powers. And Joanna Newsom at the Circolo degli Artisti on Sunday evening was an extraordinary event. From the moment she stepped out on to the tiny stage accompanied by her brilliant band - pared down from the full orchestration of her last album Ys to only a violinist, a mandolin and banjo player, and percussionist – and sat at her harp to play the opening number Bridges and Balloons, the crowd fell into an awed silence only erupting into rapturous cheers after waiting for the dying final notes of the song to fade. This in itself already seemed a small miracle after the excellent support band, The Moore Brothers had struggled to out sing the noise of constant chatter that had sadly accompanied their Californian harmonies throughout their entire set. In fact, Joanna thanked them profusely on several occasions and said they were her favourite band of the moment. This generosity of spirit was apparent throughout her entire performance as she laughed and beamed between songs, and charmed the room with a combination of sheer genius and radiant beauty...because Joanna Newsom is strikingly beautiful in the flesh – more so, even, than in photographs. The words bellissima and bravissima were heard repeatedly between songs! Stunning versions of Emily and Monkey & Bear followed the opening song, before treating us to two numbers from her first album, The Milk-Eyed Mender - The Book of Right-On and Inflammatory Writ. Sawdust & Diamonds was another perfect gem in a faultless set...Closing the main show with a beautifully measured Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie, she came back on stage with a very special surprise for the encore. A completely new song that she said she had never performed before and had only just finished writing! Could it get any better? Yes, it could...she finished with Sadie, one of my personal favourites.

Here's that new Joanna Newsom song:


And the exquisite Sawdust & Diamonds:

Damien Rice | The Auditorium, Rome | 19 July, 2007

If you enjoy Damien Rice's music you just have to see him live...there are no two ways about it. His performance in the open air Cavea at the Auditorium in Rome on Thursday night was staggeringly good. A consummate musician and performer who moves with ease from guitars to keyboards, he manages to add something indefinable that turns the live event into a truly magical evening. Certainly, the vulnerability expressed in his soul-laid-bare lyrics really comes into play when the guy is singing in front of you, but what really catches you by surprise is just how much more intense every song sounds live; four years down the line numbers from his debut album 0 still sound fresh, and really felt, whereas newer songs from 9 (like opening song Rootless Tree which he played solo at the piano) are instant classics.
As the final song of the main set Damien stepped away from the microphone and sang Cannonball totally unplugged. Rome audiences are not usually good at sitting quietly without chattering through concerts (or movies for that matter) but you could have heard a pin drop as the entire Cavea fell silent and leaned forward to listen...and then sang ever so gently along. Wonderful.
The closing song of the encore was another delight. Throughout the concert Damien had hardly said two words other than mumbled and barely audible introductions of band members. He introduced the song Cheers Darlin', however, with a very funny monologue about a drunken evening in a pub and a failed attempt to pick up a girl; he then proceeded to sing the entire song as if he were drunk, smoking and drinking red wine and staggering off stage to ecstatic applause.
Another personal favourite theatrical moment for me was Eskimo...as the song reached its crescendo, we were treated to some simple but very effective lighting effects – suddenly the Auditorium had become a swirling snow scene! The audience gasped in child-like wonder...
The full set list as follows – (thanks to Nine Crimes, excellent Italian Damien Rice fan site)
1. Rootless Tree (Damien solo on piano)
2. Volcano
3. Insane
4. I Remember & Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)
5. Dogs
6. Delicate (Old Tomatoes intro)
7. Me, My Yoke & I
8. Accidental Babies
9. Eskimo
10. The Blower's Daughter
11. Cannonball (unplugged)
Encore
12. Coconut Skins & percussion jam with band
13. Sleep Don't Weep
14. Cheers Darlin' (with monologue)

Scissor Sisters | The Auditorium, Rome | 17 July 2007

...and a fabulous time was had by all! People had turned out in very small numbers (staggering when you look at the eBay haggling for seats in the UK) but what we lacked in numbers we made up for in enthusiasm! (Ricky Martin was also playing to sellout crowds in Rome that night throwing Roman gays, no doubt, into a quandary...)
So yes, we were at the Auditorium again this week, our favourite concert venue, although the outside space at the Cavea - a kind of open air amphitheatre - which is used during the summer months lends itself less well to rock concerts. In fact, Jake Shears & Ana Matronic both mentioned how weird they found the place - the stage is very large and set well back from a seated audience... Except, at a Scissor Sister's party nobody stays in their seat for long - anybody not up and dancing after a couple of songs were challenged directly by Ana "Are you from the Press?...Or are you Swiss?"!!
Scissor Sisters arrived in Rome in a year that has seen the increasingly vocal and oppressive anti-gay stance of the present Pope and the hopeless and ineffectual attempts by the Prodi government to instate some kind of real and workable civil partnerships law for gay couples. Scissor Sisters' anecdotes about Pope Joan, the only woman pope, and their suggestion that we try to imagine what the world would be like if the pope were a transexual , couldn't have been better timed! God bless Scissor Sisters and all who sail in her!
The encore was a rapturously applauded I Don't Feel Like Dancin' and they closed the night with a brilliant Filthy/Gorgeous although for some strange reason it's Jake's falsetto in Tits on the Radio - dedicated to Fellini at the concert - which is still going round my brain two days later!

Badly Drawn Boy in Concert Review | Laghetto dell'EUR - Rome | 21 June 2007

What is perhaps not immediately obvious about Damon Gough aka Badly Drawn Boy until you see him perform live is just how charismatic the man can be. Performing to a small crowd at the Laghetto dell'EUR in Rome last night he opened a two hour set with Born in the UK and followed that with two further songs from his latest album of the same name - Degrees of Separation and A Journey from A-B. It was during the fourth song, however, All Possibilities from his third album Have Your Fed the Fish? that he really wooed the crowd with his disarming sense of irreverent humour swaggering up and down the stage, assuming a rock star pose and defying anybody to stay seated. By the end of the song he had us eating out of his hand...getting us to clap along when he told us to and then turning on the charm once again by dedicating The Further I Slide to all the beautiful women of Italy.
Renowned for being a perfectionist – in a brief moment of rage he threw one of his guitars across the stage – at the beginning he seemed frustrated by some technical hitch, but the Rome audience loved him and seemed to cajole him out of any bad mood. Part of a mini-tour to promote the current album BDB also played some real gems from all his previous albums – Silent Sigh and Donna & Blitzen from the About A Boy Soundtrack Album were stand out wonderful versions; This is That New Song from One Plus One is One was very moving after his intimate introduction; You Were Right from Have You Fed The Fish? was another highpoint (he named this as his own personal favourite song he'd ever written); an acoustic version of The Shining from his first album, Mercury Prize winner The Hour of the Bewilderbeast; closing with a blistering version of Everybody's Stalking.
After having flown over to London to see him play One Plus One is One in its entirety a couple years ago at the Royal Festival hall it was wonderful to see him in such a small venue, although it surely can't be long before he's playing to bigger audiences in Italy too. Come back soon!