Dionne Warwick: moments of beauty from a pop legend
For nearly three decades, Cheltenham Jazz Festival has been cheerfully repudiating the claim that jazz is “niche”. Sure, this music might have had its big moment in the middle of the 20th century, but it’s still everywhere today, living on in a dozen other genres. Each year, the festival – which kicked off on Wednesday and runs until Monday – manages to serve up something for everyone, not just the turtle-necked brahmins. Over the coming days, there’ll be performances from the piano virtuoso Brad Mehldau, the funk-inflected Brand New Heavies, the born-again bluesman Robert Plant, even Jay Rayner. You could argue that Sophie Ellis-Bextor is pushing it a bit. But I have a soft spot for her, so I won’t.
On Wednesday, though, it was Dionne Warwick. Now 83, the American singer is back in Britain for a short tour, and it made sense for proceedings to begin with her: in the 1960s, she did as much as anyone to bring the rhythms and harmonies of jazz into the mainstream through her work with Burt Bacharach (a certified aficionado) and Hal David. She is a superstar, a pop matriarch, with 100 million record sales under her sequined belt. It takes a lot to persuade several thousand people to come and sit in a marquee on a damp Wednesday evening, but she did it.
Still, there’s no getting away from the fact that all those decades of hit-making have taken their toll. Warwick arrived on stage resplendent but frail. Her charm and wit are fully intact, but she doesn’t sound like she used to. Walk on By, her opener, was missing its strut; indeed, she performed it sitting down. Throughout the set, notes once conquered so serenely either petered out or didn’t quite materialise.
But as things progressed, she gathered strength. By the time we’d reached I’ll Never Fall in Love Again – a jeu d’esprit about the grossness of men – she was perambulating, and the song retained its staccato sass. Later she was joined by her son, David Elliott, for a duet: a soaring rendition of I Say a Little Prayer. It helped that Warwick’s three-piece backing band (whose tuxedos gave the impression of an alumni reunion) were as solid as could be, letting loose in the bossa-tinged Do You Know the Way to San Jose. The standout number, however, was Alfie, written in 1966 for Michael Caine’s film (and also commandeered, somewhat less classily, by Cilla Black). This was an intimate, vulnerable performance – yet for those few minutes, Warwick’s voice rallied, swooping and gliding, dissolving the years.
For all the mischief in her patter (at one point she upbraided the audience for being too self-conscious during a singalong), there was, inevitably, an element of melancholy. Her finale, That’s What Friends Are For, another duet with Elliott, felt underpowered, and the show finished 15 minutes early.
But did anyone feel short-changed? Not a bit. The big top echoed with stamps and claps, hoots and whistles. One woman at the front appeared to be re-enacting the All by Myself scene in Bridget Jones’s Diary, G&T held aloft. A brief encounter with a true great. Sometimes that’s enough.
Touring nationwide until July 6 (officialdionnewarwick.com); festival runs until May 6 (cheltenhamfestivals.com)
