Louise Clare Marshall gave another superb performance at Pizza Express. She seems to get better every time she appears on stage.
Louise opened the night with two of her own songs taken from her second album, ‘In My Mind’ and ‘Beautiful’, the latter being the title track. On ‘Beautiful’, Louise played the piano, as she did on her next three numbers which were in memory of the late great James Ingram who passed away recently. These included his most well-known song ‘Yah-Mo Be There’ which he recorded with Michael McDonald.
Early in the second set the excellent band (Luke Smith on keyboard, Dave Ital on guitar, Carlos Hercules on drums, Steve Pearce on bass and Karl Vanden Bossche on percussion) left the stage and Louise duetted with her sister, Melanie, on the title track from her debut album ‘Wait for You’. Louise’s daughter Alicia then took to the stage and played a piano piece with Carlos Hercules on drums and then sang a duet ‘Eleanor Rigby’ with her Mum. Alicia, who is about eleven years old, is very talented but came across as a very humble and grounded young girl, a credit to her parents.
The band returned and the show concluded with a version of ‘Moon River’, Louise’s own ‘Guess I’m Really Sorry’ and a reggae version of ‘Chain Reaction’. The audience brought everyone back for a two song encore Candi Staton’s’ Young Hearts Run Free’ and Aretha’s ‘Rock Steady’
Louise has a beautiful voice and is an accomplished song-writer (her songs sat comfortably alongside those written by Lennon and McCartney, Artetha Franklin and Henry Mancini) and is fast becoming a very good live performer. The band were superb and were each given opportunities to show their skills. Karl Vanden Bossche’s tambourine solo was a rare treat, I can’t remember witnessing one in my forty-seven years of gigging.
It is great to see Louise perform in intimate venues. She is very charismatic and seems comfortable taking the lead, if you like music she is a must see.
Johns London Music Reviews 