Concert Review 20th August 2018 – Mike Hall
It was the last concert of the summer for the year and we welcomed Mike Hall who opened the evening with a Jungle Book medley. We had to agree it was some years since he had played for us, a fact that he didn’t fail to point out. Mike is an advocate of the Orla range of Instruments and with him he brought two, the GT8000 and a smaller portable keyboard the KX10. During the evening he made a point of talking about these instruments and their abilities. No doubt instruments enthusiasts appreciated the detail. His music, as we would expect included variety of style and form, this of course means you cannot please all the people all of the time. Overall it was a good evening’s entertainment. We listened to the music he produced and when Mike offered to play whichever instrument, we the audience preferred, it was obvious most of us were quite surprised by what we were hearing from the smaller portable KX10, an impressive instrument, It was called for time and again. At least two members of the audience have since gone looking for one themselves.
Some of Mike’s music included. A jungle book medley, Take a chance on love, A big Band Gershwin Medley, a ‘Pipe’ organ medley, Tie a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree’ ‘Eye level’ from Van der Valk, ‘Thinking about the things we used to do’, Smokey and the bandit – eastbound and down, The Candy man, The Kyle of lochalsh, Psalm 23, Dream – Johnny Mercer, Mack & Mabel – I won’t send roses, 76 Trombones in the hit parade, A rock and role medley, The Odd couple.
Posted in Concert Review Tagged with: A concert - The Organist Entertains, bokc.BOKC, brentwood, brentwood organ, Live music, Mike Hall, mountnessing
Concert review 23rd July 2018 Brett Wales
The long hot dry summer of 2018 continued, Brett Wales our musician for the evening was greeted on stage by an audience of 36 Members and 15 guests. Brett who travelled down from Nottingham introduced himself and with a laugh and a joke set about producing an evening of music worthy of a much larger audience. The performance was full, lively and encompassed many styles. Performers like to turn themselves out attired to impress. Brett played the first half of the concert wearing a dark shirt light jacket and with his hair swept and tied back, he immerged after the interval to whistles cheers and other applause. There was Brett in a flamboyant move suit and a crimson tie, quite a surprise. After the performance ended Brett was of course recalled for an encore itself a medley all received to great applause. Brett’s instrument – a Wersi sonic. Some of the evening’s music -Gladiator, On a street where I live, when your smiling, How can you mend a broken heart (BG’s), Blanket on the ground, Intermezzo (Cavalier Rusticana), Day by Day, A Helios organ tribute, ABBA medley, I left my heart in San Francisco, Pirates of the Caribbean (Zimmer), the lady and the tramp. Interval This old house, River dance Ballet, ToTo Africa, Bohemian rhapsody (Queen), In a Persian Market (Albert Ketelbly), William Tell (Rossini), Fulsome Prison Blues (Johnny Cash), Sound of silence (Simon and Garfunkel), I can’t help falling in love with you, One moment in time (Whitney Houston), Equinox (Jean-Michel-Jarre) He’ll be coming round the mountain, Encore – A medley!
Posted in Concert Review Tagged with: A concert - The Organist Entertains, BOKC, brentwood, Brentwood Organ Keyboard club, Brett Wales, Live music, mountnessing
Concert Review 25th June 2018 Ian Griffin
It was the 25th of June, perhaps the first month of hot weather of; ‘the long hot summer of 2018’. Our artist for the evening Ian Griffin had travelled from Wales to entertain us and was, he said, returning to Wales at the end of the performance.
We listened to an evening of good and varied music and of course a helping of welsh humour. Ian took the trouble to explain details about the instrument he was playing, its history development and other nuances, The speakers he explained were ‘Bose’ a prestigious US manufacturer but, like so much today, now made in.. China.
Some of the music we heard included:- To begin, I will go where the music takes me, I love how you love me, (Bobby Vincent) This time tomorrow. Hits from Dusty Springfield, Steve Wonder, Neil Sedaker – miracle song. There were big band, musical and orchestral sounds including, I got you under my skin, it had to be you, born free, softly as I leave you, if I were a rich man, as long as he needs me.
As before for us, Ian opened the second half up to ‘The audience choice’ for an hour he played our choice of music without a written note of music or script, just our request notes passed in the interval.
For an encore he played us out to Ski Sunday.
A thoroughly good evening that surely included something for all and played on Ian’s Ketron.
Posted in Concert Review Tagged with: A concert - The Organist Entertains, BOKC, brentwood, brentwood organ, Brentwood Organ Keyboard club, Ian Griffin, Live music, mountnessing
Concert review 23rd April 2018 Andrew Nix
Another good concert with our Artiste for the night Andrew Nix. The audience numbers for the evening were disappointing perhaps due to another event, Seacroft. It was also the first night for the club renewals for 2018 – 2019.
True to the character portrayed in descriptive comments about Andrew, he did have a true Yorkshire sense of humour very much in evidence throughout the evening. We enjoyed a ‘two for the price of one’ evening with Andrew as both keyboard musician and comedian. Some of the music we herd included. With sword and lance, a buddy holiday medley, a medley of traditional Irish songs, When Irish eyes are smiling, Fire Dance, and an Irish gig. Then there was you, a Sigmund Romberg Medley, Music Box Dancer, Pretty Face Polka, and the Lambeth Walk. After the interval we heard the Beer barrel polka, Roll out the barrel, Good Morning Good Morning, Somewhere over the rainbow, wedding of the painted doll, Impossible dream, A Beatles medley including Money cant by you love, Yesterday, Hey Jude, then Fly me to the Moon and finally a Dixieland medley. There were calls from the audience for even more and so on the spot of the moment Andrew produced a medley of snippets from many other well known tunes. In all a very good evening.
Andrew’s instrument was a Roland Atelier
Posted in Concert Review Tagged with: Andrew Nix, BOKC, brentwood, Brentwood organ and keyboard, concert, Live music, mountnessing
Concert Review 26th March 2018 – Dirkjan Ranzijn
Dirk, as he suggested we call him, arrived… He had just made the journey from Holland to perform for us. His character like the instrument he brought with him was much larger than life. We had an evening of great entertainment with a wacky sense of humour made all the more amusing because of the constant distorted translation from Dutch to English.
Dirk brought the audience into his performance and encouraged participation. We were rocking in our seats and some even found themselves jumping out of them at times or waving arms in the air to make the letters YMCA. The music we heard was a very accomplished performance and with the requested encore ran slightly overtime. Many rose to their feet at the end of the performance.
Amongst the music we listened to were; Beautiful noise, Lugarno (A piece composed by Dirk whilst in Switzerland) Bizet Carmen, Standing by, Valerie, Spirit of Norway, Willie Nelsons, “On the road again”. A medley from Grease, A rock and roll selection, because we believe, A Latin American selection, the Snow Waltz, Tequila sunrise, that will be the day, YMCA, Tulips from Amsterdam. Bless Em All, Unforgettable, and A medley from Les Miserables.
The encore was itself a medley of many other pieces.
Dirk’s instrument was a Bohm Sinfonia 480
Posted in Newsletters Tagged with: A concert - The Organist Entertains, A concert – The Organist Entertains, BOKC, brentwood, Brentwood organ and keyboard, Dirkjan Ranzijn, Live music, mountnessing, Ranzijn
Concert Review 27th Nov 2017 – Michael Sullivan
It was a cold November night perhaps that had an effect on the instrument Michael had with him to play? The adage, ‘Putting all your eggs in one basket’ never seemed more relevant. Perhaps we forget that’s what our artistes do when they sit in front of us with their ‘one’ instrument on which to entertain us for the evening. When things go wrong with the keyboard what do you do in front of that audience who expect to be entertained, but you as the performer are sat at the keyboard of a broken instrument? It was particularly the instruments foot pedals, these latched to the last note played and held the note. For Michael it must have been disastrous for his confidence and ability to entertain, it wasn’t really until the second half of the evening when Michael began to overcome problems with the instrument and his performance recovered.
A flavour of the pieces played included; Anything goes, Sleepy Shores, Liberty Bell, Puppet on a string, The Sound of Music, Buddy Holly pieces, Arrivederci Roma, A Gershwin selection, Tiger Rag, Maple leaf Rag, On the sunny side of the street, She wears red feathers, a TV medley including Cross Roads and Z Cars, and toward the evenings conclusion, MacArthur park.
Michael played a Yamaha Tyros 4 with 2 Yamaha MSR 250 powered speakers plus Ketron midi pedals linked to a Roland SC 33 sound module.
Posted in Concert Review Tagged with: A concert – The Organist Entertains, BOKC, brentwood, brentwood organ, Brentwood organ and keyboard, Live music, Mike Sullivan, mountnessing
