Review of Teen Gig on April 1st

(Picture taken at the recent gig at The Duchess, featuring Awoken, one of the Teen bands who performed on 1st April at our own little gig!)

This fabulous little gig was held Wednesday evening in our main music room with its nice intimate atmosphere, after a long session where the club members had created and rehearsed something that was ‘experimental’ or ‘challenging’. So although first-time performers could present a cover, the idea was to push the more seasoned performers to doing something just that bit out of their comfort zone.

First we had a little blues impro – featuring Robyn improvising on her tenor sax and with a Les-Paulish solo from Thomas on guitar. Next up, Thomas doing a couple of weird and wonderful arrangements, then Steve on a song created that afternoon, Beth with an original, Sol and Karina with their keys/vocal arrangement, Chloe and Karina covering “The Climb” (well done to Chloe who did her first ever performance!), the highly professional Jodie with two of her own numbers, a rap version of “Stormy Weather” featuring Robyn on sax, an original by James, and finally two originals by Awoken.

I loved every minute of this! These guys are a really talented bunch, at the forefront of excellence, representing SMART with style. Not only can we boast that the awesome Awoken are part of our Wednesday night group, but also Jodie Wortley, an experienced and accomplished soloist, and several other emerging bands/solo artistes. As one of the audience said about the gig, “Some of the original stuff is good enough to buy!” Can’t wait until GroFest in June, where the Teens will be performing next. Then of course there’s the Big Gig July 11th! See you there