Old-school cool is balanced with urban attitude this week.
? ‘Any fool knows that bravado is always a cover-up for insecurity,” quipped Bobby Darin when asked what the secret was to singing standards from the Great American Songbook.
Clearly Gavin Minter has been listening — no hammy neo-Vegas lounge-lizard hustle à la Michael Bublé. Respect is what Minter is after and respect is what he gets when the veteran Mother City crooner swings through standards from his South African Music Association-nominated big-band album, I’ll Be Seeing You. He will be performing with his new septet featuring guest saxophonist Buddy Wells. Minter’s ability to bewitch, bother and occasionally bewilder the listener pivots on his impeccable phrasing.
Audiences can expect serenades, romantic cool-jazz readings, breezy Afro-Brazilian bossa nova conversations and sensitive interpretations of standards, including As Time Goes By, I’ve Never Been in Love Before and Lakutshon’ Ilanga. Minter will debut new arrangements by European composer Goran Strandberg. Mike Campbell’s 18-piece Big Band provides the support.
Trinity, 15 Bennett Street, Green Point, June 20, 7.30pm for 8pm dinner theatre. Entrance is R50 (presale) or R60 (door).
? How does a consciously hip-hop crew survive in a consumer world described famously by critic Greg Tate as ‘there’s really nothing to celebrate about hip-hop right now but the moneyshakers and the moneymakers — who got bank and who got more”? Well, if you’re Sama-nominated hip-hop heroes Tumi and the Volume you realise that con-shizzle needn’t trump consciousness.
‘Music has a shorter shelf life now. We have become like a fast-food market because of the iPods and music phones,” said Tumi in an interview with the Mail & Guardian earlier this year. ‘With Pick a Dream it was [about] recognising this and having to make songs that are quick on the surface but the depth is still in what I say.” Relax. After nine years of keeping it conscious, they aren’t suddenly selling out, they’re just hoping to earn a living. ‘We wanted a big produced album. We wanted our songs to play on radio stations and in your car.” Expect a frenetically funky fusion of melodic raps, pan-Afro futuristic grooves, soulful R&B reanimations and jazzy hip-shakers.
The Assembly, Harrington Street, East City, June 18, 9pm. Entrance is R40 (presale), R60 (door). Website: www.theassembly.co.za. Book at: www.webtickets.co.za.