Sam bought a table at a benefit performance and dinner for the performance space St. Ann’s Warehouse and we joined him and some other friends. The music was incredible — it was Hal Willner’s Rogues Gallery project (pirate songs and sea chanties) performed by a wonderful band and some wildly divergent singers. I gather the project was initially linked to Johnny Depp and his pirate movies, which sounds pretty tacky, but he gave Wilner a wide berth and it ended up as a wonderful concept record.
There were no speeches; the music just started. It was a great band, all acoustic — fiddles, trombone and tuba, pump organ — though some electric guitar, too — and some of the combinations of singers were incredible. There was a version of "Barnacle Bill the Sailor" with Antony doing the “Who’s that knocking at my door?” part, and a woman named Kembra (in a kind of kinky superhero outfit) and a bearded man named Baby Gramps (who sounded like a Tuvan throat singer doing Popeye) sang the bawdy replies.
A different person sang each song, though there were some who returned and sang backup for their friends. Bryan Ferry with Antony, Robin Holcomb, Lou Reed and Laurie, Gavin Friday (he did a wild filthy Brechtian tune that was great).
As it was a bit of an all-star evening I doubt they’ll take it on the road or even manage to do it quite like that again…but if Carnegie offered…(I wrote and suggested this to Carnegie.)
Then dinner was served on lazy susans so everyone could help themselves. A really inspiring evening, sort of typical of St Ann’s programming, which made a lot of sense for any attendees who hadn’t seen some of the recent shows at that venue. The benefit became an example of what you were supporting, and for benefit prices you got something truly special, possibly unrepeatable.
