Report by: June Clark

Performer : David Harrild
Instruments : The New Roland E80 Portable Keyboard.

For our Concert on the 8 th March, we welcomed DAVID HARRILD from Kent.

For many of us, it was our first experience of listening to the new Roland E80. David opened his show with “The Sunny Side Of The Street”, followed by an enchanting saxophone romantic ballad “The Way We were”.

Big band sounds for “Sea Jam Blues”.

Theatre Pipe Organ “doodles” with sounds from the Roland Atelier of “Cabaret”, “A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square” and “Hello, Dolly”.

James Last’s “A Man Without Love”, followed by a piano solo of “Let’s Fall In Love”.

Big band sounds of “Take The A Train”, followed by “Stranger On The Shore” - with hand movements over a beam that brought sounds of the waves gently lapping on to the shores - panning left and right.

Bringing us to the interval, David played a Dixie rendition of “China Town”.

“Zambezi” , followed by a classical orchestral arrangement of “Pathetique”.

Piano solo of “It’s Wonderful” and orchestral arrangement of “At Last”.

Back to the 60’s with the Shadow’s - “Wonderful Land”.

Country and Western ho-down styles for “Hello, Mary Lou”, followed by a James Last medley using sounds from the Hammond Organ - “Volare”, “Sweet Sue” and “Mack The Knife”.

6-8 ballad of the very popular “Unchained Melody”.

**Stefane Grappelli violin jazz styles for “It Don’t Mean A Thing”, and Benny Goodman big band sounds for “Caravan”.

For David’s encore, he chose to play an Irish “Riverdance” style which, unfortunately, he forgot the title to as well!

A most enjoyable evening and thank you, David, for a superb show - and not a single note of written music in sight.

** Paris born (1908) master jazz violinist and a founder member of the Quintette du Hot Club de France which brought a European influence into jazz from the mid 1930’s.

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