Reviews / Dickson and Noakes in very fine voice
VETERAN Scottish singers Barbara Dickson and Rab Noakes won rapturous applause following their show in front of a packed auditorium at Mareel on Sunday night.
It followed a 75-minute trip down memory lane from the duo encompassing old folk classics and pop standards.
The pair took to the stage kitted in supermarket attire and using bits of borrowed equipment after Flybe miraculously managed to lose their baggage on a single flight from Edinburgh to Sumburgh earlier in the day.
Dickson said she was inclined to “sock it to ‘em” for the mix-up – and she sure sounded like she meant it.
Thankfully the pair had taken their guitars on as hand luggage and they were not deterred from delivering a set steeped in nostalgia and featuring robust harmonies, a combination lapped up by the near sell-out crowd.
There were powerful takes on songs from their recent EP ‘Reunited’, with opener ‘Do Right Woman’ harking back to the days in the sixties when they sang together in folk clubs – having first met in the Sandy Bells pub in Edinburgh.
Both sexagenarians looked lean and healthy and were in very fine voice throughout as they drew variously on their own respective songbooks and material from Gerry Rafferty, James Taylor and Bob Dylan, amongst others.
Noakes’ own song ‘Branch’, from his recently reissued ‘Red Pump Special’ album, was a compelling number, while Dickson delivered her Sunday best vocal on ‘Minorie’, the Scottish version of traditional muder ballad ‘The Twa Sisters’.
Heading into the home straight the pair reeled off ‘Sleepless Nights’, first popularised by the Everly Brothers and later Gram Parsons, before finishing the set with a sentimental singalong rendition of ‘Que Sera, Sera’.
The encore saw Dickson dust off one of the hits from her days of 1970s pop stardom, ‘Caravans’, to the evident delight of many concert-goers.
Another standard made famous by the Everly Brothers, ‘Long Time Gone’, rounded things off as Dickson and Noakes departed, applause ringing in their ears, with a promise to return to the isles before too long. Hopefully their luggage will be able join them next time.
With the billed support act, Freda Leask, sadly unable to perform due to laryngitis, popular Orcadian folkie Kris Drever had earlier stepped in for an excellent five-song set.
Drever moved to the isles in late 2013 and next weekend heads into the studio to record an EP featuring several Shetland musicians, which is to be launched with a concert at Mareel on 9 September.
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