Jamie Cullum at Newport

I finally got my chance to see Jamie Cullum perform live last night at the opening of the Newport Jazz Festival (it's 56th year!).

It was a gorgeous summer night--cool with a Newport harbor breeze, clear skies after a late afternoon shower. Mr. F got these tickets(up near the front in the "gold circle") back in the spring when the line-up for the Jazz Fest was announced, and being a Cullum fan (and yeah, Mr. F likes him, as well) we had to go!

I hadn't been to the Casino since a tennis match there back in the ...80's? I forgot how beautiful the place was with the old shingled buildings(the International Tennis Hall Of Fame and Tennis Museum is housed there, and tournaments are still played on the grass courts) and grounds. The stage and seats were set up on the main grass court, covered temporarily with a flooring of bouncy metal. As the sun went down, the stars sparkled overhead. What a great place for a concert it was!

It was, as I suspected, from having been to other concerts in the summer in Newport, full of people dressed in "Newport" style--lots of men in blue blazers, pink trousers, straw boater hats(I even saw an older gent dressed in a complete seersucker suit) and ladies in tasteful sheath dresses and some even wrapped in pashmina shawls. Not your average concert crowd--but there were some more less traditional folks mixed in(like me and Mr. F)

The "gold circle" wasn't any kind of circle, but simply excellent seats about 7 rows back from the stage. We got there(after having a tough time finding free street parking somewhere near a mansion) mid-way through the opening act of a very young Grace Kelly(no, not that Grace Kelly, of course) and her band. She's an 18(!) year old saxophone musician from Boston and she rocked(liked her best on her and her band's rendition of "Round Midnight").

Jamie(all 5' 3" of him) was as good--well--better!-than he sounds on his CD's--and I wanted the show to last longer(he did come out and do an encore--his electrifying version of Jimi Hendrix's "The Wind Cries Mary"). His voice has that growly, emotional edge and his flying fingers on the keyboard were amazing. Not to mention his incredible stage presence!

I found a review of the concert from a writer at the Providence Journal. He must have sat right down after the show ended and wrote it. His review is spot on(although I wish he, like others, wouldn't bring up that comparison to Michael Buble who he is NOT in any way similar to and if anything, miles ahead of Buble in the talent and creativity department) We, instead, wandered the streets looking for any place in town that had a late night menu.

There was nothing! The bars were packed but it seems no place serves food after 11:00 in that town.

We finally found a A-1 Pizza on Broadway and I was so starved by then, the placed seemed(and smelled ) like Nirvana when we stepped in there(and the help was suprisingly cheerful and upbeat for having to be working after midnight, too!).

I don't know what's going on with me--I am a hungry beast again, so I'll have to go and rustle up some breakfast.

Cullum opens Newport Fest with a bang

12:08 AM Sat, Aug 07, 2010

Concert Jamie Cullum,

The Grace Kelly Quintet International Tennis Hall of Fame,

Newport Friday night

BY RICK MASSIMO - Journal Pop Music Writer

NEWPORT - "Seats are for jazz concerts," Jamie Cullum shouted Friday night at the International Tennis Hall of Fame as he encouraged the audience estimated at 2,300 to get up and crowd toward the stage. Well, this was the opening night of the CareFusion Newport Jazz Festival, so one could be forgiven for thinking it was a jazz concert.
Judging from the opener, a smooth, swinging "Just One of Those Things," you'd certainly think so. The 30-year-old pianist-singer took a fleet piano solo and sang in the style of young revivalists such as Michael Buble.

Then again, there was that cover of Rihanna's "Don't Stop the Music," and the one of Radiohead's "High and Dry" (with an arrhythmic bit of "Singin' In the Rain" with dissonant piano echoes), and the one of Jimi Hendrix's "And the Wind Cried Mary" - all done in piano-jazz style, but with a rock spirit.

And the bouncy piano pop of "Mixtape," during which Cullum got the crowd to bounce like it was a Good Charlotte show, sounded and felt like a manifesto ("My love can paint a million tones/ From Nine Inch Nails to Louis Armstrong").

Cullum last performed at Newport in 2004 and was an even more energetic performer Friday, standing on and leaping from the piano, doing his patented cross-stage running leap during his breakout hit "Twentysomething," and taking the band into the middle of the audience for a semi-unplugged "Caravan."

But for all the dazzle, the emotional center of the show was "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?" and "I Get Along Without You Very Well," both done solo, in classic pounding and crooning (respectively) style, and preceded by the story of hearing Harry Connick Jr. and realizing that "you can be a rock star and a jazz musician."
By the time Cullum had finished a hooting, howling, scat-singing version of "I Get A Kick Out of You" accompanied only by bassist Chris Hill, his ability to inhabit standards and Top-40 hits and twist them each to suit his purposes made the old feel as new as the new had felt old.
Grace Kelly, the 18-year-old Boston-based sax-and vocal phenom, and her quintet opened the show with a sweet reworking of "Summertime," and made some real fireworks on the original "101" (helped by the powerful trumpet of Jason Palmer). Her vocals were strong too, but the nuances of her sax tone during "Round Midnight" (also accompanied only by her bassist, Evan Gregor) were gorgeous. She also joined Cullum for "These Are the Days," during which she got to show a roadhouse-style grit on the double-time section.

Source

*Update: I have added an excellent video already up on You Tube this morning,

from when Jamie and band were out

in the middle aisle doing "Caravan"(although it is incorrectly titled Newport FOLK Festival--that happened last weekend)

And one more, from someone in the crowd who must have been very near to where we were sitting because this view of the stage is basically what we saw(I did notice a woman with a phone/camera aloft to the front right of us for a good portion of the show). The crowd "sing-along" part of "Mix Tape".

"I want everyone in this "tennis center" to JUMP!"