Laura Mvula and Black Voices -Kings Place Kings Cross – 23/01/2019

Six women from Birmingham came to London and gave a scintillating vocal performance that had a sold-out audience at Kings Place on their feet shouting for more at the end.
This was the fourth time that my wife and I have seen Laura Mvula perform. We’ve seen her with her own band, with her band and orchestra, solo and now with Black Voices. She is one of the UK’s best singers, best song-writers and an accomplished pianist; she is innovative and she has a very bright future ahead of her. I still cannot understand why Sony dropped her from their label, a decision I hope they will regret. Black Voices are an a capella quintet who were formed in 1987, I find it hard to believe it has taken over 30 years to find them but I am so glad I have. The members of the group are: Carol Pemberton, Sandra Francis, Shereece Storrod , Celia Wickham-Anderson and Beverley Robinson. We should all be grateful to the group’s founder and director Carol Pemberton, who is Laura’s aunt, because Laura told us that without her support, perseverance and encouragement she would not have become a successful artiste.
This show opened the 10th London A Capella Festival and was part of the Kings Place Venus Unwrapped season celebrating women in music. The music industry still seems to be male dominated and many talented female artists remain unsigned, so it is good that Kings Place is championing women.
Singing a capella is exceptionally difficult there is nowhere to hide if you make a mistake. From the opening song, Nina Simone’s ‘Four Women’, on which Laura and Black Voices sang, this was perfection.
The theme of the night was to celebrate the women of the world. Six of the songs were Laura Mvula’s own compositions from the ‘Sing to the Moon’ album, the remainder were songs written and sung by women. The only instrumentation was provided by Laura Mvula who played piano when singing her own songs and percussion on some of the numbers provided by Remi Fadare.
It is difficult to highlight any of the songs, they were all very good. However it was great to hear Black Voices sing an a capella version of the reggae hit ‘Uptown Top Ranking’ (During this song Laura Mvula was just offstage having fun dancing and joining in with the vocals.) There was another Black Voices song that just featured the a capella sound of instruments being played. During this song the audience were invited to play their instruments but only the air variety.
A number of the songs of the night were originally sung by Nina Simone, others included one written and sung by Edith Piaf. The show ended with Laura Mvula’s ‘Sing to the Moon’ and Nina Simone’s ‘Be My Husband’
Laura Mvula looked totally at ease singing with Black Voices, as if it were a regular occurrence. The night was such a success that I hope this is not going to be the only time they sing together.