09-04-2001 Revolver

In a secret late night show last week, violin virtuoso Nigel Kennedy played to less than 30 people at Club Acoustica.

Throughout various writings, Beat Generation stalwart Jack Kerouac described the overwhelming feeling of seeing legendary jazz cat Charlie Parker blazing in his prime back in the 1950s. NY folk stories woven way past midnight in a small back alley jook joint, all kinds of smoke hanging around like dirty fog over Hudson Bay, the small intensely focused crowd screaming 'yeahs' and 'woos' whenever the virtuoso player onstage did something to excite them. There was something magical and transcendent in those secluded underground circles that are now mere stagnant words on the page.

Last Thursday night, I found out what Kerouac was talking about. There was a tip-off that the world's most famous violinist, Nigel Kennedy, was playing a secret gig at Club Acoustica upstairs at La Bar on Oxford St. Having seen Kennedy at the Opera House just one week earlier, a sublime and wondrous performance backed by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, I was having trouble visualising the same guy on a tiny stage at a place like La Bar. This is the genius who, in between recording adapted renditions of Hendrix and The Doors songs, entered the Guinness Book of Records for the biggest selling classical album of all time, his version of Vivaldi's Four Seasons. From that to a few quick tunes and a drink on Oxford St?

Turns out the tip off came through.

Somewhere after 1am, after murmurs he wouldn't make it (he was due at 11pm), Kennedy bounced up the stairs, apologetic and resplendent in white beanie, black cargo pants and a faded T-shirt emblazoned with an aboriginal dot painting. By this time there were only 25 people left in the room, I was seated three feet from the stage and Kennedy was beaming in that over-abundant childlike way he is renowned for.

Joined onstage by Caribbean singer and guitarist friend Caleb Clarke, an equally enthusiastic chap, Kennedy lined up his various effects pedals (five in total) and revealed a violin that was a rainbow coloured piece of twisted metal. Both of them were incredibly jovial, hi-fiving and hugging and boisterously laughing for the hour or thereabouts they were onstage. Caleb, in his sealesque voice, bounced off Kennedy with sweat gleaming off his forehead.

I unfortunately missed Jimmy Hendrix last time he was in town, but from what I can imagine, tonight, Kennedy was my Hendrix with a violin. When he fed the instrument through a wah-wah pedal and various delays and effects through the second song, the sound was so close to the Experience I closed my eyes and instead of a stumpy white English geezer with the world's worst haircut I was indeed somewhere you only get to visit once in your life. When you know how rare and special an event like this is, you can't help trying to grasp every last finicky detail the night presents, little brushstrokes on a canvas masterpiece. So the sound was too loud and the people in the back were talking incessantly and the songs themselves weren't super, bit there was still something about being amongst a small select few watching the world's greatest violinist in a dingy cafe bar at 1.30 in the morning.

I imagine the folk at Club Acoustica are still trying to figure out how the fuck they managed to pull it off. I'm infinitely grateful they did.