Guitarist Stefan Roach channelled all his uncertainty, heartache and fear over the global Covid-19 pandemic onto his acoustic guitar, during an emotional performance at “The Art of Guitar” concert, on Sunday, at Queen’s Hall, St Ann’s.
Micheal Mondozie
Roach debuted a haunting original piece entitled “As of Midnight- a reflection of the pandemic” that silenced a near capacity audience, among them Port of Spain mayor Joel Martinez.
The emotive instrumental took its title from Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley’s now famous starting line, when announcing the latest adjustment to pandemic restrictions, during the months of lockdown last year.
Roach’s musical score reflected the equal measures of anticipation, dread and anxiety nationals must have felt on hearing those words. His fret work was immaculate and intricate finger picking impressive. Still, Roach was clear in his message of love being the most potent medicine in overcoming darkness and despair when he switched cadences to play another of his originals: “To Live”. The instrumentation dedicated to his wife Olivia Seheult, mirrored the joy, hope and will to survive many in his audience must now feel with the relaxing of restrictions and return to normal operations in T&T.
Earlier, an impressive and eclectic cast of musicians, singers and dancers joined the gifted guitarist on stage for a flamenco performance of “Farucca” during the opening curtain call of the two-night concert. Roach’s Sunday night encore followed their Saturday opening night performance before a sold-out Hall.
Aptly titled Return of the Strings, Roach’s showcase follows a pandemic-forced two-year hiatus for most of the returning cast of musicians, among them, bassists Aaron Low Chew Tung and Matthew Sammy, drummer Rhys Thompson and percussionist Modupe Onilu. Tabalchi Kiran Sankar, cellist Chelsea Fensom, violinist Abigail Cooper and pannist Johann Chuckaree, with a rousing-audience-pleasing rendition of Kes’ (Kees Dieffenthaller) Carnival 2022 hit “Jolene” also appeared on the night.
Singers Wendy Sheppard, Nickaela James and LeAndra Head shared a memorable moment with Roach on stage during a moving Bob Marley medley that included the late Jamaican reggae legend’s “One Love” and “Three Little Birds”. Roach invited the ladies to gather around an oak barrel stage right and poured them each a glass of wine during the segment, much to the amusement of large sections of the audience—no doubt perturbed that they too couldn’t break the Hall’s no drinking in the auditorium policy.
Music to dance to
Modern dancers Maria Davis, Yia Loren and and Katie C (Katherine Carrera) added some much-needed movement to the stand-and-deliver production when they intermittently tip toped their way on stage to join the festivities. Flamenco dancer Nalini Akal, meanwhile, rumba, cha-cha and tap danced her way into the audience’s favour during a series of impressive cameos of her own. The moment of the night, however, belonged to the poised and polished students of Roach’s Stefan’s Guitar Academy. The music school’s different age groups, ranging from 7 to 18, shyly shuffled on stage to show what they had learnt over the past year, much to the delight of their applauding parents in the crowd, performing “Ode to Joy”, “Calypso”, “Taconeado” and “Ejercicio”.
Advanced students Julianne Solomon and Mia Jimenez shared a special moment on stage during a duet performance of “Lagrima” on their acoustic guitars that literally drew howls of approval from the supportive audience.
Anisa Halliday, however, stole the show with an impressive solo of US-born Trinidadian composer Ralph McDonald’s “Just the Two of Us” and Frank Sinatra’s “Fly Me to the Moon”. Halliday’s intricate fret work and supreme confidence provided visual and aural proof that Roach is as good a teacher as he is a musician.
