The Lounge Walrus: February 2009

My fabulous fiancee took me away to Germany this weekend. She didn't tell me where in Germany until we made it to the departure lounge, and she didn't tell me why until we were on the plane. So at about 7.15pm on Friday evening, just above Luton, I opened a card telling me I was on my way to see Bobby McFerrin in Dortmund. I didn't even know Dortmund was in Germany, if I'd been asked I'd have guessed Holland actually. But I was quite excited at the prospect of seeing someone like Bobby McFerrin. I've been fascinated by one of his tunes since I was about 18 (not that one, though it's pretty good - "Thinkin' About Your Body", which was on a jazz compilation that got played at school quite a lot). And visiting Germany for the first time (well, second time, I went to Berlin when I was 3) was quite exciting too.

The hotel was lovely. The breakfast on Saturday morning was lovely too - Elissa had arranged breakfast in the hotel, and it consisted of as much bacon, sausage, toast, scrambled egg, cereal, jam, ham, salami, cheese, pastries and fruit as possible. No, as much as you wanted. Though the first morning we ate as much as possible.

We wandered into town and looked around the market. We were amazed at how busy the streets were, throughout the centre of town. The market had all sorts of lovely looking food - olives, fish, cheeses, nuts, dried fruit. It made us wish we hadn't eaten quite so much at breakfast actually. We ended up picking up about 30E worth of food and drink from a nearby Waitrose-esque supermarket, and we took that back to the hotel room for late lunch. Naps ensued and 8pm was approaching all too fast, so we grabbed something to eat and went to the Konzerthaus, where we ordered a beer and sat watching the crowd. We got the impression concerts like this didn't happen in Dortmund all that often, as everyone was quite dressed up.

When the concert started, Bobby McFerrin came out in jeans and a t-shirt, and sat down, and just began singing. It's very difficult to describe this, if you haven't heard it for yourself. He has a huge range, including his falsetto, and switches from low to high effortlessly. He strikes his chest gently, to define the start of a note and create a percussion track for many of his songs. His own song "Drive" and his version of The Beatles' "Blackbird" sound like full band songs, and it's just one man with a microphone. Each note seems to hang in the space and fill the room (though a healthy dose of reverb probably helps with that). As I suspected I would, I've failed to convey the sound at all. Go and get some, and listen to it.

After 15 minutes of unaccompanied improvisation, he started alternating solo numbers with audience participation. He asked the audience to hum a single note and riffed over the top of it. He divided the audience up and gave them something to sing. He jumped on the spot on stage and sang a note, then jumped again. The audience sang the note. He jumped to the left and sang a higher note. The audience sang that note. And then he introduced another higher note. From then on, in that song, he played the stage like a keyboard, with the audience providing backing to another great improvisation. He had the audience sing "Ave Maria" while he provided the accompaniment, which, while a little bit too echoey in such a big room, was very effective.

Then he brought out a choir, and they did something they'd been rehearsing, which was impressive. But then for the next 20 minutes, he used the choir as a loop pedal, 'recording' tunes with the sopranos, altos, tenors and basses in turn, switching them on and off with a gesture, and singing all the while. For one song he invited someone up on stage to perform an interpretive dance to what he sang, with part-convincing, part-hilarious results.

Shortly after that he held up a spare microphone and said "I have a microphone and a chair - who wants to come and sing with me?". "Me!" I thought, but didn't quite have the bottle, to start with. A couple of people got up, one who made lots of very low noises, which he interspersed with shrieks and higher notes, and percussion. One who just picked some notes at random, and he played off that. Then he said "Well, it's been pretty good, but I was really expecting someone to just come up and sing the blues or something". I didn't need asking twice, and this time I managed to persuade my legs to go along with it.

As I walked on the stage I said "I had to have a go or I'd have regretted it the rest of my life". The first ten rows went "Aah....". I turned to Bobby and said "Was that too much?". He said "No." I said "Hi. I'm Matt". He said "Hi, I'm Bobby". Then he said something about getting on with it and singing a blues, and started singing a bassline. For once, I was lost for words to sing, so I sang the bassline with him, and let him take the top end. I could hear the tremor in my voice - I was terrified! My mouth was drying out. I didn't really cach the words he sang, but then he dropped back into the bassline and it was my turn. I said "I can't think of any words". "It doesn't matter what words you sing, Matt. Just make up some words, Matt", he sang back. "My name is Matt, I came to a concert, I sat in the crowd, and now I'm on the stage" he continued. "I've still got nothing" I said. "Come on, just tell us what you did today....". Right, I thought, I'd better come up with something. I sang:

Today I came to Dortmund - For the very first time.
I haven't been to Germany since I was three - and I'm having a real good time (note how I deftly rhymed "time" with "time" - it got a cheer though, if you're ever singing overseas, just say you like the country, everyone will cheer).
Then after the concert.... Don't know what I'm gonna do!

And by the end, I wasn't nearly as nervous (though still shaking slightly), and I think I was probably nearly shouting. The audience was clapping along, and as Bobby brought the bassline to a close, I threw in a harmony (albeit a weak, slightly out of tune one). We stood up, 1,200 Germans applauded, we hugged, I said "Thank you, that was a real honour", and I wandered back to my seat, in slight disbelief of what had just happened, and thinking "If only I'd prepared something".

Anyway. The rest of the concert I just sat there grinning to myself. A lady who had come from the back of the concert hall was making her way back to her seat (she'd been waiting for me to finish) and the audience went "Aaaah... " again, so Bobby invited her to join him on stage too, and she was much more composed than I, and very talented. And a few more numbers and a standing ovation and the show was over. The audience clapped for an encore, but instead, Bobby came out for a Q&A session. After a number of pretty useless questions, Elissa put her hand up and asked what his earliest musical memory was, and he told us about a song he used to sing with his sister, when he was three and she was 18 months old. And then we made our way back to the hotel.

The next day we spent relaxing in the hotel room until about 3pm, as they have a 5pm checkout on Sunday (Yes!). We had a coffee and a hot chocolate in a local jazz bar, wandered round town a bit and picked up a nice poster Elissa had seen the previous night. And found out why town was so busy on Saturday - everywhere shuts on Sunday. About 5pm we made our way back to the airport, had a quick bockwurst and jumped on our plane, leaving a city I suspect I shall have fond memories of for a long, long time.