I went to see Cleveland Watkiss at the Bernie Grant Arts Centre as a fan of his voice, converted from seeing him over ten years ago at the Royal Festival Hall. His voice filled the auditorium, surrounding you with warmth, depth and melody. I went with this memory in mind and excited about hearing just his voice in surround sound multilayers.
The show opened with a Cleveland walking onto stage barefoot and very relaxed. He took command of the stage with his first tune Lets face the Music and Dance. And he did dance. His chosen instruments of technology – a sampler loop machine and a cordless microphone – enabled him to create a head nodding backing track and the freedom to move about the stage.
The second piece was more of an urban speed freak kind of tune with an electronic industrial element in vast contrast to the first track proving that, musically, anything is possible and that we should not limit ourselves in how we enjoy and explore music.
With just his voice as the brush with which to fill the blank canvass of the Bernie Grants Arts Centre’s black box venue, Watkiss orchestrates his vocals to paint diverse scenes in musical techni-colour displaying his vocal range in terms of pitch and agility. This project has clearly enabled Watkiss to satisfy his fascination of exploring the dimensions of the human voice. I sense there is more to come.
Watkiss strikes enough of a balance between banter with the audience, movement around the stage and some sing-a-long audience participation to not seem self indulgent and to draw us into the his world where he explores the possibility of improvised vocal play with serious musical virtuosity.
The gospel spiritual “Hallelujah” was so surreptitiously built on the sampler – Watkiss sang a long vocal line that you were not aware was being recorded. The tune had sweet chord changes that only became apparent when he began to sing the lead line and add harmonies. A clever well thought out piece of music.
He closes the show with classical number that has him imitating a German opera singer. He pulls it off tongue in cheek while still displaying his love for music and as a serious business that can be playful and entertaining.
His post gig interview with BBC3’s Kevin Legendre was done in a desert island disc style which revealed much more about Cleveland approach to his music rather than your average one to one Q &A. Cleveland informs us that his desire to do such a show was heavily influenced by his respect and love for the work and skills of Bobby McFerrin. And we hear hints of McFerrin’s style through out the show. Cleveland also hails Clifford Brown, Dizzie Gillespie and Duke Ellington as some his major influences.
In his rendition of Thelonius Monks Blue Monk Cleveland recreates that huge sound of the big brass band with complex and colourful arrangement of vocal parts including an intricate scat session, a double bass solo and amazingly precise imitation of a trumpet solo heralding the show his background as one of the original Jazz Warriors.
Watkiss goes from cosmic, industrial, deep blue spiritual, straight ahead jazz improv, to soul-funk gospel. In fact the show was a universal travel through time as well as around the globe displaying all the music that has influenced him through out the years of his vocal career.
The treasured tone and soul of Watkiss’ voice is so strong and with the tour of the Jazz Opera “Bridgetown” we can see Cleveland moves from strength to strength.
Written by Zena Edwards
October 2007