Ears ringing again.

Rainbow & I partook of a little more audio entertainment last night.
Jools Holland & his Rythm & Blues Orchestra at the Hexagon Theatre in Reading, Berks.
Fabulous! Simply stunning. The man is a genius & a joy to watch. A real showman who had the crowd enthralled from the moment he sauntered onstage. The Hexagon is "in the round", with a raised stage surrounded by seating on all sides & a "mosh pit", as I believe the young people insist on calling it, which held several hundred standing fans. We had seats just a few feet from the stage & about 6 feet above it so had a great view of the mayhem.
I've been a big Holland fan for years & have all his albums but I've never seen him live before. Seated at his trademark baby grand piano, he was surrounded by no less than 18 other musicians, every one of whom seemed to be selected for their -erm, individuality. Some real characters among them, from the ageing Rastafarian trombonist to the leggy blond lady saxophonist to the long haired, sandal wearing hippie trumpeter. A real rag-tag collection, all milling about on the stage, wandering from microphone to microphone, ambling up to centre stage to perform solos, joking & fooling around with their fellow musicians, but playing really tight & producing a stunning big band sound. 5 saxaphones, 4 trombones, 3 trumpets, 2 guitars, drums, assorted singers, Jools' brother, Chris Holland, on electric organ, & in the middle of it all, pulling it all together, the man himself.
Did you know Jools also plays guitar? It was a revelation to me. Duck walking along the stage in his wide red braces & matching red & black wing tip shoes, he played a very creditable boogie woogie guitar version of an old Steve Earle number, Red Dress, backed by that stomping wall of brass sound that really made your hair stand on end. Loved it.
Lots of tracks from the new album, released last week, interspersed with some more well known material & a few solo virtuoso semi classical piano pieces. Think my favourite was the gorgeous Bumble Boogie, a lightning quick boogie version of Rimsky Korsakov's Flight of the Bumble Bee -one of the first records I ever bought, as performed by B, Bumble & the Stingers -God, I'm getting old!
Lots of good vocals. All the guest singers from the new album were there too. The gorgeous & super strong voiced Sam Brown, Ruby Turner doing several gospel/blues numbers, Solomon Burke -an enormous whale of a guy with a fabulous deep Southern soul voice, who normally uses a wheel chair but was rolled onto the stage on a huge throne to belt out half a dozen standards including a great version of the Blues Brothers' Everybody needs somebody to love -& top of the bill of support, Marc Almond, who's big band treatment of his classic Tainted Love had the place singing along to every word.
A damn good evening's entertainment. A stage literally crammed with performers, every one of whom sang & played their socks off -not just to entertain the masses, but because they very obviously loved it as much as we did. Several encores but I'd have happily listened to 'em all night. Think they would've played all night too if they could.
Thoroughly recommended.