REVIEW
Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell with Richard Thompson
When: Saturday
Where: Alix Goolden Performance Hall
Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)
You can hear the slightest of sounds at the Alix Goolden Performance Hall, from the pluck of a guitar string to the creak of a floor board.
That type of close-quarters intimacy makes for sensational concertgoing, as the full house on Saturday witnessed first-hand during Emmylou Harris’s local debut.
No communicative page was left unturned as Harris and her good friend Rodney Crowell turned in a night of real-deal humour and heartache inside what Harris called a “jewel box of a building.”
Townes Van Zandt’s Pancho and Lefty simmered with an acoustic alchemy, while Love Hurts (more Everly Brothers than Nazareth on this occasion) oozed with a twangy resonance. It was like watching an intimate living room jam session.
It was everything and anything at the Alix Goolden, courtesy of Harris and Crowell.
The night began with a superb opening set from astute British singer-songwriter Richard Thompson.
The former Fairport Convention member was exceptional, even though it was just him and a guitar. He was chatty, and had members of the crowd (many of which cheered him loudly) on his side early.
They were there until the end, pushing for him to return for an encore following his very strong 45-minute set. His was a selection of songs that touched on the entirety of his career, from ones written solo (1952 Vincent Black Lightning) to those penned alongside his then-wife, Linda Thompson.
He even delivered a stirring version of Fairport Convention’s Who Knows Where the Time Goes?, complete with kudos to the song’s author, his former bandmate, Sandy Denny.
Thompson was top-shelf in every regard. There was an issue with the stage lights during his set, and once corrected by a stage hand, the crowd burst into applause.
“That was more applause than any of my numbers had,” Thompson said. “I must get this light thing built into my act.”
That was Thompson on this night: Perfectly poised, even when he joined Crowell and Harris for a few acoustic tunes later in the set.
He has been around the block or time or two, much like the towering twosome that filled the sold-out Alix Goolden Performance Hall to capacity on Saturday.
Crowell, 63, and Harris, 66, have a combined 80 years of professional experience, so when the pair and their five-piece band walked on stage it was to a standing ovation.
Within moments, they were singing Return of the Grievous Angel, a legendary duet from the early ’70s that originally paired Harris with her most famous partner, Gram Parsons.
Crowell had big shoes to fill, where the Parsons part was concerned. He held his own, though his limited voice ensured he was never going to steal gazes away from the sweet-singing Harris on this night. But to his credit, Crowell — a former member of Harris’s band who spent three years with her during the late ’70s — the Texan seemed to know exactly when to lead and when to sit back.
That said, Harris could have commandeered the stage all by herself. The songs during which she was the central figure (Red Dirt Girl, being one of the best examples) exhibited why she has star power in excess. The bulk of that has to do with her bell-like voice, but she also has a gift for making personal the simplest of song topics.
And in a venue like the Aix Goolden, that’s the equivalent of solid gold.
