REVIEW: Two of world's top vocalists grace Folks Fest

The Rocky Mountain Folks Festival felt more like an intimate cabaret for a few hours on Friday night, as the operatic pop of Rufus Wainwright and the jazzy blues of Madeleine Peyroux lent the fest a sophisticated edge.

What the audience got was two of the finest vocalists in music today.

Wainwright watched much of the Peyroux set from the side of the stage, clearly enjoying seeing her at work. A young, French-American woman, Peyroux opens her mouth and what comes out is more reminiscent of Billie Holliday than any vocalist working today.

Her band was solid as they conjured up a mix of jazz, blues and timeless originals, but it was Peyroux who carried the show.
For me, the most telling moment of the set was her cover of Dylan’s “You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go.” The song was totally reimagined into a slow, simmering, jazzy love song, with new phrasing that illuminated the lyrics from different angles. And as she sang it I thought, this woman owns everything she sings.

The smoky lusciousness that pours forth from her throat is like dark chocolate for the ears. The sound is complex and layered, more opaque than the clear folk voices that fill the festival, as if it must tease and deceive rather than simply laying out the truth all at once.
But Rufus can sing a little bit, too, and he was not to be outdone by the enchanting chanteuse.

He took the stage sans band on Friday night, with only his piano and his guitar. He was charming and funny, teasing that he was going to sing a few tunes in French since Peyroux had. I can’t remember ever hearing so many songs in French at a folk festival…

Dapper in his striped coat and comely neck scarf, Wainwright seemed slightly disturbed by the bugs and other nuisances of an outdoor festival. He’s a big city boy who said the mountains make him a bit nervous, but he embraced the night nonetheless.
I’ve seen his dad, Loudon Wainwright, on this same stage and the two performances couldn’t be more different. Loudon plays the role of the funny old curmudgeon on stage, spinning out humorous folk songs that poke fun at life’s absurdities. Rufus’ show is a soaring rainbow of sound that is utterly transporting. Loudon is earth and Rufus is sky.

His voice sailed over the crowd on Friday night, and I was struck by how fully committed he is to every line he sings. His performance is not error-free, and his vocals are not sparkling clean like the opera stars he loves, but who would want that? Wainwright exudes passion, and his big, beautiful voice contains just enough grit to make the lyrics hit home.

Which is good, because he is one of the best pop songwriters to come along in a while? He tends toward the melancholic and meditative, but he’s not afraid to spice it up with a catchy hook and a bittersweet smile.

Although he made a game effort at strumming the guitar, he’s at home on the piano bench and that sound better suits his music, allowing for the complex chord progressions that set him apart from many pop songwriters.
“Grey Gardens,” “Beauty Mark,” “Going to a Town” and “California” were all gorgeous. “Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk” is one of the best songs written in the past 20 years, with a simple and catchy melody that allows the serious subject matter to catch you with a sucker punch. His cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” shows off his voice well. And the song “Dinner at Eight,” about his relationship with his father, is remarkable and heartbreaking. The brutally honest love song is about his father leaving him as a boy, and his effort to break down his father and see the tears he didn’t get to see the night he left. It’s the honesty wrapped up in the artistry that really gets me.

Above all, Wainwright’s songs are beautiful. It’s true of his lyrics as well as his music. One of his encore songs was the final aria from his opera, “Prima Donna,” that recently premiered in Europe. The song, he said, is about the protagonist watching fireworks and commenting on how beautiful and short they are, “like many things in life, and life itself.”

A Rufus Wainwright concert is one of those things, always beautiful and too short.

Although the night belonged to the young and the sophisticated, the Friday lineup was one of the deepest I’ve seen at the Folks Festival, with Peter Himmelman, Mary Gauthier and Dougie MacLean highlighting the afternoon sets. I was excited to see them all.
Himmelman is a great improv performer, the Robin Williams of music, who has worked for years to remove the filter between his subconscious and his mouth. And he has the wit to pull that off. He had the audience up on their feet, making a giant circle around the festival grounds. Unfortunately, this has become his usual shtick, and it somehow seems less spontaneous when you’ve seen the same thing from him before.

Mary Gauthier brought the mood waaay down after that outburst, with her depressive set. The rain started to fall as she took the stage, and she said she was the perfect performer for the weather, as if the heavens begin to weep as soon as she picks up her guitar. Gauthier is a great songwriter; I enjoy her albums and play some of her songs over and over again.

Yet, onstage, she falls flat, because she refuses to allow any variation in mood. When I heard her preaching at Song School, she was fiery and impassioned, but she doesn’t bring any of that positive energy to the stage. I know she’s big on telling her truth through her songs, but nobody’s truth is that one-dimensional, is it?

Even if her life does suck, I still want to be entertained. Is that so wrong?

Dougie MacLean flew in from the Scottish highlands to pour out his brogue and his bag of great songs. He’s long been a favorite in my house, so seeing the man behind the voice was a thrill. He said that he lives in a remote part of his country where he’s surrounded by evidence of human civilization from thousands of years ago. That timeless quality has rubbed off on his music. Songs such as “Caledonia” and “Feel So Near” could be around for a long time.
He also believes in the folk tradition of teaching your songs to the audience and having them sing along, coaxing the crowd through many of his choruses. It was a delight.

FOR MORE ABOUT THE FESTIVAL, CHECK OUT THE ARTS BLOG.