Herb and Co. at City Winery NYC

jazzdre

Well-Known Member
I went last night to Herb's concert at The City Winery and I gotta tell ya folks, I was soooo ...HAPPY!! Happy that I went(my cousin was there with me) and we had a greeeaat time!! A great time was had by all; the place was packed, and everybody was just groovin' and jammin' to Herb and Lani and the band. It was all love as we say here in Brooklyn. The concert opened with his video of "Wonderful World", then the band came on stage,then Lani came on ,then Herb came on stage. After the video, if I recall correctly, the band played their version of "Human Nature", then they played a medley of Herb's greatest hits. My cousin was disappointed that Herb didn't play out the full version of "Rise", but decided to include in his medleys selection.

In between songs, he did his stage patter;talking about how "Rise" became popular;acknowledging that the great Frankie Crocker played it a lot because Frankie loved the tune so much;we all got a chuckle when Herb said that " this was all done legal, folks we didn't pay him or anything!!"(for those of you who don't know, Frankie Crocker was a very popular radio DJ here in NY;he was a DJ at the radio station that we still have here in NY called WBLS a top R&B station.Sadly, he passed away a good while ago.) Then he said the song got more popular after the infamous "Luke and Laura" episode on "General Hospital". (You could see that Herb was somewhat embarrassed by the usage of the song for that particular episode.) What's so unique about this concert is that he was showing video clips of his old TV specials with the Brass, his solo videos, and Lani's videos.

Then Lani had her spot where she was sang her old Brasil 66 songs, with videos of her with Sergio Mendes, and old photos of her with the band. The band all had their solo spots, with Bill Cantos doing some incredible scatting along with his piano playing, same with Mike Shapiro, and Hussain Jiffrey on their respective instruments.(BTW, it's Hussain who sings lead on "Ain't No Sunshine", not Bill as I had thought.) Herb also had us do a sing a long on "This Guy's In Love With You" which was cute. They did other songs, then they closed out with their version of Barry Manilow's "Copacabana". He told us that you may not remember the songs themselves ,but you'll remember the FEELING;which I thought was very nicely put. Everybody was blown away by the concert last night! Even these ladies that were sitting across from my cousins and I; one of them aid that it was the best concert she attended in a long time! My cousin had heard some of Herb's music, but when she went last night, she became a bona fide fan! Herb you were right the FEELING was definitely important, and you brought that in spades last night. Thank you maestro for a great evening.
 
Oh yeah, I forgot that Herb closed with "Copacabana"! He really should think about recording it; his version is smokin' HOT!!

jazzdre!
 
Back
Top Bottom