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Concert Review at the Barbican, London
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The Independent UK, Concert Review at the Barbican, London >>
When Mariza first fetched up on these shores, she seemed a creature from another planet. An androgynous figure, with hair looking like a peroxided skullcap and coiffed like ocean waves, her voice reflected her mixed origins in Mozambique and the back streets of Lisbon. Her manner was haughty, emotionally removed.
The figure now sweeping on stage in a futuristic black gown was very different: worryingly thin, hair plastered down and with a seemingly desperate eagerness to please. She'd travelled the world, she explained in the notes to her new CD Terra, and tonight's songs would be the fruit of those travels. Terra represents a welcome rejection of the massed-violin effects that she has been dabbling in: its centre of gravity is back in fado, scoured by salt tears and the sea. For the Barbican gig she'd simply brought a pianist-trumpeter, a percussionist, a bassist and Portuguese and Spanish guitars, these last two instruments being the bedrock of Lisbon's blues.
Starting straight in with a series of traditional fados, her voice had its trademark cleanness and clarity, while her declamatory gestures reinforced the emotional climax of each song. Prowling the stage with stately assurance, she did her best to draw people in, but since Portuguese speakers were heavily outnumbered by Brits in the capacity audience, the language barrier prevented true engagement between the singer and her listeners. Things sparked when she took a dip into Africa (though it sounded more like Cuba), and when she bleached out all instrumental colour for a percussion-backed "Barco Negro". Her weepy little trip down memory lane, with a song dedicated to her father, was just the right side of mawkish. But her favourite fado - "Primavera" - hit that language barrier with a thud. Only those who understood the words could have savoured its terrible irony, in that the coming of spring simply makes her want to die.
That was supposed to be the last encore, but what followed was wonderful. She threw away her mic and came downstage with her two guitarists to form the timeless fado trio, and when we heard her lovely, unamplified voice, we realised what we'd been missing. Her Portuguese guitarist sang an answering verse, in a timbre you normally only hear on old shellacs. Then she whipped her band, her audience and herself into a wild Cuban frenzy, which could have gone on all night.
By Michael Church
11/04/08
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