The music normally served at Googlies on a Thursday night is jazz of the serious kind. Instrumentalist of various genres are the usual fare playing to hard core foot tapping jazz aficionados. But last nights guest acts bucked the trend. We were given a festive helping of two of Britain’s best female vocalists in the form of Anita Wardell and Trudy Kerr. This was not a night of hard nosed sax playing but of laughing smiling performers in red frilly cowgirl hats. They admitted they had spent the day shopping in Brent Cross, something it is hard to imagine being done by Peter King or Ben Clatworthy.
But whilst the atmosphere may have been on the lighter side the music was still of high quality. Both Anita and Trudy have superb singing voices and they were a joy to listen to. There were plenty of standards such as The Girl from Ipanema, Misty and Lullaby of Birdland. In the last set Anita sang ‘I Thought about You’ and shared a chorus with bass player Michael Cole. The musical chemistry and understanding between them seemed very intense and for me was a high point of the evening. Wardell and Kerr either shared the stage or sang solo. Wardell’s style was scat singing. Her 4 bar interchange with resident sax player Bill Yeomans was excellent and showed that the improvising voice can be a match for a jazz instrument any day. Kerr’s style was more laid back and smooth but still with a great deal of character and warmth.
The evening drew to a close with a couple of Christmas songs which were ably assisted by the assembled throng. ‘ White Christmas’ and’ Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer’ are always guaranteed to get a crowd singing and last night even had your humble correspondent joining in, at least I can now say I have sang at Googlies.
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