The Bridgewater Hall in Manchester hosted a one night only concert of Arooj Aftab, a very accomplished Pakistani singer-songwriter, on June 20th. Support was provided by the London Contemporary Orchestra, ably conducted by Robert Ames.
It was a different evening. I’d not heard of Arooj before, but she has an amazing voice, and the lyrics, in Urdu, were of a haunting lyricism and at times hypnotic or even dreamlike – even if most of the audience didn’t understand what she was singing about. She has an amazing vocal range and it’s easy to understand why she won a Grammy award.
The orchestrations were very good, and most of the songs were elongated by fantastic playing, most notably by the cellist (unfortunately there wasn’t a programme so I can’t credit them), but full marks must go to Engin Günaydin on percussion/drums, and Petros Klampanis on bass, both of whom also provided vocal accompaniments.
Arooj was a textbook example of self-denigration: when a few people left after 30 minutes, she said she understood, as she also had difficulty staying the course in some of her friends’ events. There was also a good plug for the Royal Nawab (the recently reincarnated dining palace in Stockport, which I can recommend).
The only really jarring factor came just before the final song in the 55-minute set, when, for some reason, she announced she was having her period, and said she’d dressed for comfort. Given that we were looking at an extremely well-dressed woman it was just a bit too much information, but then this was compounded when she said, “well f*ck it”. A shame, as until then we were in the palm of her hand.
My only other criticism would be the back lighting. The rotating flood spots occasionally blinded us (even in the choir circle) when a proper spotlight on her would have been better.
Ahead of Arooj, we had a warm-up from Matt Wilde, a keyboard virtuoso, who opened the evening with a 40-minute set, accompanied by a trumpet player (again, I can’t credit him as there wasn’t a programme).
The first improvisation went on a bit, with the same chord progressions endlessly repeated, until they both deemed we’d had enough, but then the second number was almost the same. Two further numbers were more grounded, and they left the stage wishing us a great time with Arooj, whose next performance is in Nottingham on June 22nd.
Paul Schofield for Canal Street Online