Dasha Logan: Finesse behind the mic

When I looked up Dasha Logan on Google, the first thing I noticed was a bunch of very nice pictures of her. It made me doubt that I could contribute to this in any kind of interesting way. 

But after I watched the two TED talks by Brene Brown, about vulnerability and shame, I figured what the heck.

Then I also noticed that practically none of her shots had a facet that made her face, with nothing but beautiful features, look so charming; diastema. I don’t know whether it is personal, but I think that that small separation between the two front teeth adds great character to a face, especially a very pretty face.

I saw Dasha at the  Sing Jazz club last week.

 It was one of these nights I had to choose between two events. Either it was going to be Tim O’Dwyer at B28 or Dasha. I reasoned that I will have enough opportunities to see Tim in the future. Dasha however resides in KL so chances of seeing her on a regular basis are slim. So sad…

Dasha dashed over from KL by car with her fellow band members Gabriel and Steve. Gabriel is a bassist

and Steve is drummer,

 so the pianist needed to be locally sourced, and who better than Mario Serio. 

Mario has been accompanying a long list of singers on his Vox series, which is happening every Thursday at Sing Jazz and therefor he knows the piano as no other.

 

For Dasha, Gabriel and Steve it was the second performance of that week at the same venue. Considering that there was a reasonable crowd.

 

Overall it was a very nice performance, with a very good song choice. I was also impressed with Dasha voluminous voice, 

and the occasional growl that seems to try to awaken the beast within while the  audience was focusing on the beauty of the music.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jose Luis Montiel: Son of Mexico.

It is becoming my favorite place to go listen to some good Latin tunes. Senor Taco at Clark Quay; Singapore kind of reasonably priced, fun staff, good crowd and of course the great Ireson band with

Alina Ramirez Melendez

Martin Elias Reyes

Mario Alberto Lopez Lara

This time NOT with Carlos Sendros

The regular feature Leo Munoz

Something special would need to be offered for me to drag my butt to Clark Quay on a Sunday evening though. What drew me to it this particular Sunday night was Jose Luis Montiel

from Mexico who would be pleasing us with classic Son Cubano. Of course I had never heard of Luis till I received Alina’s invitation but I had heard of the genre Son. I guess everyone knows the beautiful melancholic tunes made popular by the Album Buena Vista Social club. 

Great music for Sunday evening blues. Louis though not from Cuba, to my uneducated ears, perfectly capturing the sentiments of the Cuban Son, melancholic, bluesy with a sense of humor that makes hard life more bearable.

 

On that Sunday night the audience seemed to be mainly the, to me, familiar Latin dance pack. I thought it put a bit of pressure on the band to move away form Son and play more Salsa style music. Only now I know, thanks to Wikipedia, that  several Latin dance music styles are derived from Son Cubano . 

So much for Melancholic and Bluesy. I guess those were the Buena Vista tunes that stuck most for me.

It was no longer the kind of relaxing evening I had intended to have but nevertheless very enjoyable.  Most people were, for the camera's ability, dancing in the dark, but it was still fun to play with the band members’ images and the "silhouettes"  in front of them

Not being much of a dancer myself I could only enjoy watching the dancers move, some more gracefully than others, with the music.   

And as an added advantage, I now had a reason to return the following Monday, because I was told, the band would stick more to the originally announced format... Son.

 

Fusing Saigenji and L.A.B. ; A results of good taste

Aya announced it with her usual enthusiasm a few weeks ago, using her Bon Gout  Music event planning brand. Saigenji was going to be back in town after 7 years. 

I know of course that time flies but I do remember Saigenji’s last visit very well and could not imagine it had been that long. 

It also made me realize how long I have been living in Singapore and been following this section of it’s lively music scene.  And it is a very lively music scene where I sometimes feel, that even with over 90 posts in this blog, I am not even scratching the surface of what is going on here in live music.

In a way it is fantastic to know that even when I sometimes attend two venues at the same evening there is still so much more going on and that in it’s own unorganized way, it is working for so many people.

It is also fantastic to witness some one like, for instance Alemay Fernandez, being randomly, invited to the stage and see her bringing the house down in a way that will humble any finalist of the Voice and X-factor, to date and in the future.

But last Thursday night at Blu Jaz Café was not even about Alemay. 

It was to begin with about L.A.B. who delivered us a beautiful first set with cool song choices and fun delivery and on top of it all about the return of Saigenji. I am sure that the L.A.B. rats;

Aya Sekine Keys

Michaela Therese de Cruz Vocals

Teo Jia Rong Drums

Timothy De Cotta bass and vocals

With DJ and on EWI Kevin Guoh

don’t mind if I say that they may have stolen a nice part of the show, by the start of the Saigenji set the audience was fired up red hot, Akane was the theme from head to toe,

But after that Saigenji managed to steal peoples hearts that evening. Presenting songs from his album “one voice, one guitar”, delivered with endearing charm and enormous passion left us all wildly enthusiastic

It was a surprisingly busy night, the 3rd floor of Blu Jaz was filled to the ceiling. 

Which for one indicated the popularity of the singer, many in the audience were Japanes, but secondly that with hard work on organization, marketing and promoting an event you can fill a venue to a highly satisfactory level.

As mentioned several guest to the stage some along side Saigenji. I was pleasantly surprised by the duet of Saigenji and Rizal in particular.  

Saigenji as well, appeared so impressed with Rizal’s voice and Portuguese, that he appeared to be looking for the signs from above that may have been helping Rizal.

Rizal appeared to confirm !

A photographic overview:

L.A.B.

 

Saigenji