NIGEL Kennedy is an irritating son of a gun.
Now a middle-aged geezer (to borrow his own over-used word) he persists in protesting his hormonal rhetoric: "Growing up is something I haven't been overly interested in so far." And he tries to underline that with his effing and blinding. He's not as bad as that foul-mouthed cook Ramsay, but as Kennedy effed away at the Usher Hall on Wednesday night, I was aware that many youngsters (thankfully not mine) were in the audience.
The irony in the great Nigel's manufactured anarchy is that he has become profoundly establishment. He's as iconoclastic as they come, but the one-time nutter, though he wouldn't admit it, has grown up. And it showed on two levels in his blinding playing at the Usher Hall on Wednesday.
His performances of extracts from Bach's Third Partita and the Second Sonata were as soulful and intense as you get. His one-man playing of the Double Concerto was stupendously acrobatic. And the clever atmospheric links, provided by Kennedy and his awesome trio of acoustic guitarist Rolf Bussalb, bassist Yaron Stavi and snare drum genius Krzysztof Dziedzic, were as apposite as they were atmospheric.
The second half tribute to Fats Waller, featuring How can you face me now?, Crazy 'bout my Baby, Sweet and Slow, with a theme-laced medley referring to Honeysuckle Rose and many others, was magically intimate in the breathtaking chamber music discreetness of Kennedy and his musicians. A wonderful show with a standing ovation.
Just rinse your mouth out, Nigel, and leave the demotic on the Aston Villa terraces, where it belongs. You're a hero to your fans: don't insult them.
HHHH
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