Blues in G Minor: 4 Women at its best when Shakura S’Aida performs her own material

By MEL ROTHENBURGER

ARTS/ ENTERTAINMENT (REVIEW)— Shakura S’Aida calls her symphony concert tour Blues in G Minor: 4 Women because, she says, legendary artists Nina Simone, Etta James and Billie Holiday made her who she is.

Of the four women on stage — three of them represented by their music — at Sagebrush Theatre on Saturday night, S’Aida gave the best performance. Let me explain.

As S’Aida told the appreciative audience, she doesn’t sing like the celebrated three — and this certainly wasn’t a tribute concert per se — but has been strongly influenced by them. Yet her covers of several of their well-known songs during the first half of the concert weren’t nearly as good as her own material after the intermission.

When she opened with Simone’s Feeling Good her voice had some cobwebs. Sorry, but it did. By the time she worked her way through three of Simone’s songs and the Etta James classic At Last (“I dug in my heels and said I’m not going to do this song. It’s been done, done, done”) her voice was warming up, though it doesn’t approach James’ richness and range.

She clearly feels deeply indebted to James: “The very first time I heard her voice I got it. I understood the blues.” Somewhat disappointingly, S’Aida didn’t include James’ utterly heart-wrenching All I Could Do Is Cry.

But redemption was near. Holiday’s Gimme a Pigfoot (And a Bottle of Beer) isn’t a particularly attractive song and Strange Fruit is simply disturbing but S’Aida’s version of God Bless the Child was touching.

And then something wonderful happened. Emerging after intermission in a flaming red cocktail dress, S’Aida and pianist Lance Anderson were joined by Heather Crawford on electric guitar and launched into some of S’Aida’s own material with gusto. Her voice suddenly came into its own, as if it had been daunted by the prospect of trying to match the trio of legends.

The Kamloops Symphony Orchestra was clearly enjoying itself, and so was the audience. S’Aida wouldn’t have it any other way, getting them on their feet, leading them in some finger snapping and coaxing them into several choruses.

When she got to the frenetic, defiant and joyful Geechee Woman, it was as if the audience had signed on as S’Aidra’s backup group. (I had to look up the definition of Geechee when I got home — it’s a term for the African American Gullah people who live in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina and Georgia).

Juno-nominated S’Aida, born in the U.S. but a long-time Canadian, is full of talent and clearly in love with what she does. 4 Women was a great night of soul music, especially when she reached into her own soul and gave of herself.