Producer Joe Boyd and bassist Danny Thompson involved.
Following acclaimed, sold-out performances across the UK, a special evening called Way To Blue: The Songs of Nick Drake is on its way to the Sydney Opera House November 11 and the Melbourne Recital Centre November 14 and 15.
Curated by Nick Drake’s original producer, Joe Boyd (at the helm for two of the Drake albums – Five Leaves Left in 1969, and Bryter Layter in 1970), the concert brings together renowned contemporary singers united by their reverence for the material. It is an unprecedented tribute that honours the work Nick Drake left behind by gathering some of the collaborators who were involved in those unforgettable original recordings.
The band and string section is led by musical director Kate St John, anchored by double bassist Danny Thompson, who played on many of Drake’s albums, and features the original orchestrations arranged by Robert Kirby in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Sadly, Kirby passed away very recently, but not before conducting the string section at the UK’s very first Way To Blue concert in May 2009. Now, Way to Blue has become a tribute to Kirby as well as Drake.
The special guest artists who will sing and re-interpret Nick Drake’s often hauntingly poetic material include: folk rediscovery Vashti Bunyan, Scritti Politti front-man Green Gartside, psychedelic pop maverick Robyn Hitchcock, stunning Irish singer Lisa Hannigan, American soul singer Krystle Warren, and UK success-story Scott Matthews. Australian artists will be announced shortly.
As the UK’s Telegraph reported, “It features a stellar cast – all of whom revere Drake’s music intensely.” The Times describes one of the concert’s jaw-dropping events like this: “When the truly revelatory moment happened, there wasn’t a soul in the room that didn’t feel it. Over the loud, modal drone of her own harmonium, the Irish singer-songwriter Hannigan led from the front with a version of Black-Eyed Dog that turned Drake’s darkest song into a floor-shakingly macabre jig. If anything could have roused him from his eternal slumber, this was it.”
Undoubtedly one of the most influential English singer-songwriters of the last 50 years, Nick Drake found little mainstream success during his lifetime; however, since his untimely death at the age of 26, his fragile acoustic, autumnal music has touched the hearts of millions of people.
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The concert will feature Danny Thompson, a founding member of folk-pop-jazz pioneers Pentangle, and the bassist on much of Drake’s Five Leaves Left. Over the years he has also played with John Martyn, Sandy Denny, Eric Clapton, John McLaughlin, Peter Gabriel, Ralph McTell, Elvis Costello, Kate Bush, Marc Bolan, Richard Thompson, Robert Plant, Donovan, Tim Buckley, Loudon Wainwright III and many others.
AUSTRALIAN DATES NOVEMBER 2011
SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE Friday 11 November 2011
www.sydneyoperahouse.com
MELBOURNE RECITAL CENTRE Monday 14 & Tuesday 15 November 2011
www.melbournerecital.com.au
TICKETS ON SALE :
MELBOURNE Wedneday August 17 | SYDNEY Monday August 22