Van Morrison News

2012-02-05T05:09:00.042Z

04-February-2012
The O2, Dublin, Ireland

Photo via Alan

“NO PLAN B, no safety net.” Van Morrison doesn’t need either. At a sold-out O2 on Saturday night, Van the Man could be seen swinging from a precipitous musical scale, then dangling precariously on a single, delicate refrain, with nothing to break his fall. But Morrison walked the tightrope like a true musical acrobat.

There were no big screens or special effects – just Morrison and his band huddled on a bare stage, with soft lighting to illuminate the low-key scene. If you wanted a spectacle, you were in the wrong room. But if you wanted to hear some sweet jazz/soul/rb/blues from a still-potent veteran, you had come to the right place. Few of the crowd who listened raptly as Van delivered his musical masterclass wanted to be anywhere else at that moment.

This was Morrison’s first Dublin gig in a decade, and it’s clear from how quickly the concert sold out the fans were glad to have him back. It’s also clear Van had lost little of his pinpoint precision, as he deftly conducted his band through a set featuring many of his best-known tunes, along with a few hand-picked covers, including Ray Charles’s I Can’t Stop Loving You and It’s All In the Game , a 1958 hit for Tommy Edwards. He’s also lost none of his gruff, workmanlike approach to performance, going about his business with minimum fuss or ceremony. This is his job, after all, and thankfully, he still does it well.

Van didn’t strain himself trying to reach out to the 15,000-strong crowd – instead, he let the crowd come to him, trusting his musical instincts to keep the focus on the small but tightly woven group of musos onstage. The band may have been low-key, but they delivered on the musical prowess, providing just the right back-up of keyboard, trumpet, trombone, sax, electric and acoustic guitars, percussion, bass and drums.

There were no backing vocalists to sweeten the pudding – it all rode on Van’s larynx, and he was well up to the task, building from throaty whisper to full-bodied bark, and showing his mastery of the arpeggiated vocal line. “No guru, no method, no teacher,” he intoned during one of the evening’s highlights, In The Garden , and the crowd fell silent like attentive pupils gleaning precious wisdom from the master.

The set list should have satisfied most Van fans, and included such classics as Tupelo Honey, Crazy Love, Moondance and Have I Told You Lately . There were also a few delightful surprises, such as Ballerina , from Astral Weeks . His daughter, Shana Morrison, who was the support act, joined her dad onstage for Sometimes We Cry , and returned later to help on Ben E King’s Stand By Me and Gloria , by Van’s old band Them. Alas, Van’s voice had to concede defeat on that last one, but the band took up the baton and brought the classic riff to a rousing finale. At 66, Van’s still the man to beat.

-KEVIN COURTNEY

Photo via Art

Wilson sent in this review

Saturday evening in post celtic tiger Dublin, and there’s an electricity in the air. It’s been over a decade since the great man’s last performance here, and his first in what is now called the O2 arena. Van arrived on stage at about 8.30pm, and kicked off with a jazzy rendition of Brown Eyed Girl, before treating is to some of the less mainstream material. By the time Van and his ensemble had delivered a breathtaking rendition of ‘in the Garden’, the Dublin crowd knew they were in for a very special evening. For an artist with as extensive a back catalogue as he does, it would always be a challenge to keep everyone happy. At such events, the great man has a tough balancing act on his hands - between keeping the masses happy with old favourites such as ‘Brown eyed girl’, ‘moondance’, ‘have I told you lately’ - yet at the same time, pleasing the more astute Jazz musicians in the house. A few numbers in, and the band had really stretch their legs. ‘Fair play’ and ‘little village’ were exceptional. Then of course there was the man simply pleasing himself, with a blinding rendition of the Sonny boy Williamson number ‘help me’. Have no illusions about it, he was enjoying himself.

Other highlights included ‘Ballerina’, ‘Tupelo honey’, ‘why must I always explain’ and a duet with daughter Shana on ‘sometimes we cry’ (a welcome replacement for Brian Kennedy). The audience were treated to a vast repertoire of material, spanning now six decades. All boxes were ticked, ranging in musical genres through the night in the same manner he has done throughout his career. Jazz to Blues to celtic soul and some good old fashioned rock and roll thrown in for good measure. At times Van would lose himself in the music, falling into a transient state as he encouraged the band to really express themselves. The man himself played around with a few guitar solos, a sax intro, and a few blasts of the harmonica for the bluesier tunes at the close of the evening.

The roll of the pianist on Tupelo, impromptu due guitar solos, and a little confusion over the closing number –(‘Gloria’ seemed to be the outro, until Van arrived back on stage with Shana, to do a cover of ‘Stand by me’) –was enough to give the vibe that this was an outfit not unrehearsed so as to be unprofessional, but improvised enough to be spontaneous. A true Jazz band. The great man, is still very much, on top.

-Wilson

Ciarán was at the gig & sent in this review

Wow, Well that was really something special. At 8:42 when Van walked out on stage and blasted into jazzy version of Brown Eyed Girl, taking many by surprise. The highlights for me had to be No Safety Net/No Plan B followed by In The Garden. Not many people have the ability to keep a crowd of 14,000 totally focused and completely silent when he whispers into the microphone and then, with a punch in the air, bring the volume right back up again. There were so many amazing moments though.

Moondance, Have I Told You Lately, Gloria, Help Me, Ballerina... All fantastic. There were times when he stood back and surveyed his band and conducted then through the song nodding with approval. Pointing at band members for solos and doing his ‘Yeah, Yeah, Do it again’ that he does when things are really going great. He seemed to be enjoying himself smiling. He Added Stand By Me into the set list when it wasn't originally in there. The band started Gloria and he stopped them and then launched into Stand By Me.

The sound was fantastic, the band were on fire, the set list was brilliant. At the end of Gloria Van walked off, Handed his mic to the stage hand and he never looked back. Van the Man on form is like nobody else. And boy was he on form.

-Ciarán Kilbride

Setlist

Brown Eyed Girl

High Than The World

Fair Play

Precious Time

Sometimes We Cry (w/Shana Morrison)

Real Real Gone

I Can't Stop Loving You

Moondance

Crazy Love

The Mystery

All In The Game/No Plan B/No Safety Net/This Is It

In The Garden

Have I Told You Lately

Little Village

Tupelo Honey/Why Must I Always Explain

Ballerina

Help Me

Stand By Me (w/Shana Morrison)

Gloria

Big Hand For The Band!

Jay Berliner, Guitar
Paul Moore, Bass

Dave Keary, Guitar

Alistair White, Trombone

Jeff Lardner, Drums

Paul Moran, Keyboards
Chris White, Saxaphone
Ken McDonald, Percussion

Concert Time: 106 minutes

2012-02-04T00:51:00.019Z

03-February-2012 Odyssey Arena, Belfast, Northern Ireland

Andrew at the Double Usefulness blog wrote this review of tonight's gig in Belfast

Its not often that I get to go to a live concert, but a friend of my brother had tickets for Van Morrison at the Odyssey Arena, and this evening he and I went along. I, for one, was very glad I did. What follows are some impressions and highlights from the evening:

The Playlist
The evening kicked off with a jazz (bordering on calypso) version of Brown Eyed Girl. This oldie from his earliest days set the tone for the evening, with fresh renditions, and at times studio perfect performances of songs from across his 40 years plus performing history. The audience were treated to such varied tracks as The Way Young Lovers Do, In the Garden, Moondance, Real Real Gone and covers of some blues standards such as Sonny Boy Williamson's 'Help Me'. There was little or no new material on offer and the concert was all the better for it.

The Performance
I used to go to every Van Morrison concert that was put on in Northern Ireland. I saw him play Killyleagh Castle, and enjoyed him in Botanic Gardens headlining with Bob Dylan. In the last couple of shows at the Grand Opera House, however, the singer and his songs seemed tired, the presence of Georgie Fame and Brian Kennedy overwhelmed any potential immediacy or intimacy that the audience may have enjoyed, and Morrison seemed to treat some of his own material with disdain.

None of this was evident tonight. Morrison was warm with the audience (well as warm as he is going to get!) and consummate in his arrangement and performance of every track. Vocally, his range was astonishing, managing to give an authentic growling bluesman sound to his covers, but reaching the high and sweeter notes of Astral Weeks and early career tracks. He was engaged with the material, and meticulously attentive to the dynamic of his band. Those on stage with him didn't disappoint, either. A small jazz feel to the group in no way inhibited the range of material that could be covered, and at times the synergy of backing group and singer lent the performance something very special indeed. To convey intimacy in an arena is quite a feat.

Read the rest of review here.

Belfast Music
It's a family affair at the Oydssey Arena, where Van the Man lets his music do the talking

There was a mix of anticipation and trepidation in advance of Van Morrison’s homecoming concert at the Odyssey Arena in Belfast.

Horror stories circulated about just how bad a show Morrison can put on. Rumours that he doesn’t acknowledge his audience, stands with his back to the crowd for the duration of the show, hates to play his most popular songs and is likely to walk off after 40 minutes made this homecoming gig a bit of a gamble.

The singer's petulant reputation is such that even some of Morrison's most avid fans gave his first gig in Belfast in a decade a wide berth. Expectations were low, but the Odyssey ticket prices – strangely enough – remained high.

Yet Morrison arrives on stage to the opening bars of 'Brown Eyed Girl', his most famous song, and it appears that we've got him on a good day after all. The jazzy version of the popular standard features a saxophone solo from Morrison and an instrumental section in the middle. It's an upbeat opener, and a good indictator of what's to come

Tonight Morrison only turns his back to the audience to show admiration for his accomplished musicians – and when you have Morrison's musical status, you can hand-pick your backing band. He gives each musician the respect of listening to their solo, standing back and bobbing his head or snapping his fingers in time to the music.

There is no mistaking who was in charge of the stage, however, when Morrison steps back into the spotlight. Even after a career spanning four decades, his vocal power remains undiminished.

Sometimes his voice is full-throated and passionate, his lyrics seeming to reverberate around the Odyssey. At other times Morrison whispers into the microphone, his husky voice gentle and quiet.

The balance between softness and power blends perfectly when Shana Morrison joins her father on stage for a duet of ‘Sometimes We Cry’. She balances Morrison’s roughness with warmth, and has just as strong a voice as her dear old dad.

The mid-point duet is the highlight of the evening. In its wake a series of slower numbers are taken as a cue for some to slip off to the bar or toilets. After a barn-storming start featuring favourites such as ‘Precious Time’ and ‘Moondance’ – with Morrison turning in a version that would blow any asinine X-Factor contestant out of the water – you begin to fear that the legendary singer has let his hometown audience slip away.

‘Crazy Love’ brings them back. There are cheers, whistles and mass singalongs, which are never easy at a Van Morrison gig. Morrison’s free reinterpretation of his own arrangements makes karaoke very difficult. It is worth keeping quiet, though, to hear the singer’s fresh takes of his more well-known songs.

‘Talk is Cheap’ and ‘Why Must I Have to Explain’ sound particularly heart-felt from a man who works hard to keep his private life out of the press. They might also be an answer, of sorts, to the accusations of taciturnity and his less than engaging on-stage persona.

This Belfast audience care little for the negatives, though. Instead, they revel in the music, which is as it should be. Morrison is in motion for the full 90 minute set, whether tapping his feet or waving his arms. He doesn't banter much with the crowd, but he does thank us 'for being a warm audience'.

From another performer, such a lack of audience interaction might leave one feeling short changed. From Van the Man, however, his introductory 'hello' is more than anyone expected. For him it is all about the music, not about stagecraft. And as the closing bars of 'Gloria' see him off stage, there are no complaints about that from us.

Setlist

Brown Eyed Girl

Higher Than The World

Fair Play

Talk is Cheap

All In The Game/No Safety Net/No Plan B/This is It/ Make It Real

Precious Time

Moondance

Sometime We Cry (w/Shana Morrison)

Real Real Gone

Crazy Love

In the Garden

Have I Told You Lately

Young Lovers Do

Little Village

Tupelo Honey/Why Must I Always Explain

Ballerina

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand For The Band!

Jay Berliner, Guitar
Paul Moore, Bass

Dave Keary, Guitar

Alistair White, Trombone

Jeff Lardner, Drums

Paul Moran, Keyboards
Chris White, Saxaphone
Ken McDonald, Percussion

Concert Time: 110 minutes

2012-01-31T09:06:00.000Z

I Got My Name Up In Lights

Christy Moore: At the moment, I'm very into country music - Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings and Merle Haggard. Last year, I was very into Elvis Costello. I always come back to Van Morrison - everything that he does, I get it and listen to it. But I don't listen to that much music, really. I spend too much time workin' on my own music, really. I tend to listen as a singer rather than a listener, as such.

Warren Haynes: On a recent evening, Gov't Mule guitarist Warren Haynes sat back and listened to Van Morrison's sweeping, improvisational gem Astral Weeks. While the frequent Allman Brothers Band and Dead contributor had cherished this iconic album for several decades, on this particular occasion, the 51-year-old devoured it with renewed awe. "It was a totally different listening experience," Haynes says of hearing the vinyl edition of the 1968 LP for the first time in years. "I had been listing to the CD for the past 25 years or more," he says, "but the difference (in sound) with vinyl is tremendous."

Nick Lowe: I think that’s probably the product of the Van Morrison obsession we had at the time. We were great fans of his first few records. Up to Tupelo Honey, I suppose. We loved those records. Moondance.

Dion Dimucci: I love hanging with 'The Man'... (a good friend) we got the same roots... it's all about the music!

Ian Rankin: 1989. I'd been living in London for three years. Unemployed at first, then eventually answering an ad in the Guardian to become a hi-fi journalist. But London was getting to me, as was my continuing lack of success as a novelist. I started having panic attacks and a doctor told me to get out of town. I grabbed some clothes, my Walkman and a bunch of tapes that had just arrived from Polydor Records. They were reissuing Van Morrison's back catalogue. I had never really given the guy a fair listen. I ended up in Scarborough. It was autumn and the town was blustery, near-empty. I did a lot of walking on the beach, clambering over the rocks with headphones on, listening to Hard Nose the Highway. Music as therapy. That voice, the poetry of the lyrics, the arrangements. It all seemed to make sense, and I felt myself unknotting. When times are bad, I still play Hard Nose. I have it on CD, vinyl, and on my MP3 player. Plus, I still have the tape. It's going in my coffin with me.

Marc Cohn: Q:The greatest album, ever?

Cohn: ..."The Birth of Soul" by Ray Charles. Or Al Green's "Greatest Hits." Or "Moondance" by Van Morrison. Or "Night Beat" by Sam Cooke. Or "Paradise and Lunch" by Ry Cooder. Or "Sticky Fingers," "Pet Sounds," "Harvest," "Born to Run," "The Band," "There Goes Rhymin' Simon," "Revolver," "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan," "Court and Spark," "JT," "I Never Loved A Man," "Sail Away," and "Fulfillingness' First Finale." All of them are the best album, ever.

John Hiatt: EXPRESS: It doesn't sound like you're near death or anything. In fact, as the album title makes clear, there are still a lot of new possibilities in these songs.

HIATT: There you go. That's good. I ain't dying. I'm alive. Barely. But that being said, some of these old guys are doing their best work ever. I'm thinking of people like Van Morrison or Bob Dylan. These guys are writing and singing some of their best stuff. They're older than me, so it gives me something to look forward to.

Paddy Moloney: Of all our collaborations, I've enjoyed most Van Morrison. He's chaotic and has a reputation for being difficult. It's the Irish in him. But he's a genius. We have all the falling-outs you hear about. But to me he's still the best.

Kristen Stewart: I never had any idols. I do cry at concerts if it's great, I once cried horribly at a Van Morrison concert. That was kind of an obsession.

Leonard Cohen: Cohen said not much has changed on his playlist in recent years and rattled off a list of his favorite artists with long breathy pauses between names: "The same people — Tom Waits, Van Morrison, Bob Dylan, Judy Collins."

Mark Green (Mick's Son): I also went with him (Mick Green) to stay with Van Morrison in his barn in Bath when they were recording an album together. He was a great guy and got on very well with my dad — who was really cool.

Simon Mayo: In 1989, he (Van) launched his new album, Avalon Sunset, with a live gig at Ronnie Scott's in London. The fortunate hundred or so gathered outside the club full of anticipation. We were all milling around waiting for the security types to let us in when a shambling tramp of a man in a mac (you're ahead of me), possessions in a plastic Comet carrier bag, wandered to the front of the queue and tried to get in.

The bouncers were having none of it. And so it was that Van Morrison was turned away from his own album launch. That's why, two hours later, the fortunate hundred were sitting around their tables in Ronnie Scott's jazz club while Van was still being talked into doing his own gig. Which eventually he did.

And it was one of the greatest concerts I have ever witnessed.

Ray Benson: WCP: Van Morrison helped the Wheel with its first record deal by mentioning you in a Rolling Stone interview—have you ever been able to return the favor?

RB: Yes, in fact when Van did his country record he borrowed my fiddle player and steel guitar player, and took them on the road. Van and I talked two years ago when he came and visited me in Austin about me producing an album for him but he’s still got a lot on his plate.
Ben Chasny: How did you come up with the concept of Six Organs? What initially inspired you to create the compositions you create under the Six Organs name?
One night I stayed up until dawn playing three records in a cycle: The Dead C’s Harsh 70’s Reality, Bob Bannister’s 8 Day Clock and Van Morrison’s Veedon Fleece. The original inspiration came from that night.
What was it about those three records, specifically?
As for Veedon Fleece, that record has always been my favorite. It has a great rural vibe to it. I had read that Van recorded it while driving though the Irish countryside after a divorce.

How did Veedon Fleece come into play? How do you rank Veedon in the Van catalog?

That record and Astral Weeks often trade places in my mind as favorites. Side Two of Saint Dominic’s Preview is right up there as well. There’s also a part on the live record, It’s Too Late To Stop Now, where someone in the audience calls out “Turn it on!” and Van replies, without hesitation, “It’s turned on already.” That might be my favorite moment on any live rock record. It’s a moment that can’t really be explained. You just have to hear it. Tougher than the Cro-Mags! Well, not really ...

Bill Nighy: I finished up our interview by asking him if he had a chance of another life what it would be: he told me he would be a piano player or play the guitar.

"And I'd like to sing too, if I could sing. I'd like to sing the blues like Van Morrison sings them. I think he is an absolute genius, without question. One of the few people you can in complete confidence use the word genius in the same sentence."

Eric Clapton: Q: How do you like young blues rock bands like The White Stripes or The
Black Keys?

EC: I think, they are okay. One probably can find out what I like by looking at the music in my Ipod. I have seen these bands, I respect them, I have nothing against them, but it does not move me. I am not so much interested in finding out more about the younger generation - I have never been that type. I always listened to the older types. Recently I had seen Van Morrison live and it was the bee's knees - it lifted me so high, for so long. If I listen to someone who I admire and he gives me that exaltation, then I want to keep on doing it myself.

Lady Bianca: Saxophone player Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis "suggested I sing for Van (Morrison)," Bianca recalled. "Of course, I had to do it my way. We still communicate to this day."

She sang - credited under her birth name of Bianca Thornton - on four Morrison albums between 1982-85.

She also was onstage when Morrison - the cantankerous, perfectionist bard of Belfast - recorded "Astral Weeks: Live at the Hollywood Bowl," the first full live performance of his landmark 1968 album. It was released this year on CD and DVD.

"It was fun," she said when asked about the 63-year-old Irishman's moodiness and exacting standards. "He's a great entertainer. That's what makes him him. He's so cute. If he wasn't like that, he wouldn't be Van Morrison."
Mike Farris: ...when I was a kid, I really loved Van Morrison. I loved the way Van Morrison’s songs would paint these pictures and I would always go, ‘This guy must be on a spiritual journey’. Whether he is or not, I wouldn’t know, I’ve never met the guy. But that’s the way it appeared to me, that’s what I got out of it.

Zakir Hussain: Hussain has always been interested in expanding the sound world of the tabla, often through collaboration with musicians from a range of musical genres. In the 1970s, one of his neighbours in the Californian town of San Geronimo was none other than Van Morrison.

“He would come and hang out in the living room and just see what we were doing,” Hussain recalls. Inevitably they ended up working together. “He’s such an incredible musician. I mean, when we went into the recording studio to play, he wasn’t, like, ‘Okay, you guys please put down the bass and the drums and the piano and stuff, and then I’ll come in and sing my part over it later’. He actually sat in there in the studio with all of us and belted out song after song, exactly the way he would have done it on the stage. It really put that energy out there for us to be inspired from and work with.”

WORTHWHILE MUSICAL collaboration, Hussain insists, is always marked by this exchange of energy. “You know how it is when you play with a musician you’ve never played with before,” he says. “You adjust your playing to find a way to be able to interact with them – and in doing so, you find something different about your instrument that you had not done or seen before. So playing with Van or John McLaughlin or Mickey Hart or anybody like that, I learned that there were other shades in my instrument that I had not yet experienced and should look into.

“Even in Indian music, when you play with different musicians and instruments you learn how to react to each one. Because it’s not just the music alone. It’s also the temperament of the artist that you have to work with. So you learn how to exist on stage and help create something positive.”

Graham Parker: The release of Bob Marley’s Catch a Fire in the mid-1970s helped focus his songwriting and move beyond the simple pop format.

”Bob Marley’s ‘Catch a Fire’ had come out in ‘73 or ‘74 and that made me realize that this was the future of music,” he says. ”What Bob Marley was doing — he was writing pop songs as good as Elton John was, but much hipper and, obviously, the guy had the rebel element... so that deeply influenced my music.”
At the same time, Mr. Parker had returned to his soul and R&B roots after several years of listening to British psychedilia (Cream, Jack Bruce’s solo work) and blues (Peter Green’s incarnation of Fleetwood Mac), while also discovering Van Morrison and Bob Dylan.

Mr. Parker had been familiar with Them, Mr. Morrison’s early band, “from the pop charts in the ‘60s, but it wasn’t influential until I got into ‘Astral Weeks’ and then went back to his other albums like ‘Tupelo Honey.’” As for Bob Dylan, he says he was “too obsessed with soul music,” the Beatles and the Stones as a kid to give him much of a listen.

”So, I was starting to write these good songs and when I got influenced by Van Morrison, it all came together,” he says.

But no one should confuse influence with imitation. He is not Van Morrison or Bob Marley or any of the other musicians he grew up listening to. He is not a soul singer, a reggae artist or a roots rocker. Or, maybe, he is all of the above and has been for the 30-plus years he has been recording and performing rock ‘n’ roll.

”All those forms of music have been there” in his music, he says. “And I would say that every one of them is on my first album and every single thing I’ve done since is on my first album in a way.”

Ralph Salmis: Mike: What have been your most memorable gigs?
Definitely the Van Morrison band was the most educational gig that I have done because they are not reading gigs so I have had to work on my memory skills a lot

(Mike: He has a reputation for not being very nice to drummers)

Ralph: yes he does! We did the Montreaux jazz festival and he shouted at me in the middle of a ballad but if your giving your best there is nothing more you can do, but he has the good of the music at heart, working with him is one of the best musical experiences that I have had... I did a track on the Tom Jones reload album with Van that
I really enjoyed it was great just to watch them working together...

Jimmy Fallon: Can you talk about your first guest lining up De Niro, Van Morrison?
Jimmy Fallon: (snip) Van Morrison I just lucked out because he's in the city; he's performing the full album of Astral Weeks. And if you're audiophile or if you love any music you know that that's a phenomenal record. But I'm also - grew up an Irish kid and, you know, he comes on your iPod in your brain when you're born. He's just like - he's one of my favorites of all times. So the fact that he was in town is just pure luck. And I think Astral Weeks is a phenomenal record so it's a double whammy on that one.
Has Van Morrison actually seen your impersonation of him? Do you know what he thinks of it?

Jimmy Fallon: I can almost guarantee you he has no idea who I am. I could almost guarantee that to you. But, yeah, I don't even know if I'm going to show it to him, I don't know. I don't know that guy at all. I was just psyched just to book him. I don't know if I want to, you know, piss him off before he comes on the show. But, yeah, I respect him, I love him and I could sing any song backup if he needs me.

Ciarán Hinds: What song would feature on the soundtrack to your life?

And It Stoned Me by Van Morrison. It's about knowing that when the rain comes, you should just revel in it. Sometime you will dry out, and the light will come back in.
Tom Sturridge: What's everyone's music taste?

Van Morrison is probably the most important person to me in the world. I can't really go a day without... I've already listened to about four Van Morrison songs this morning.

Gordon Lightfoot: Who are some of his favorite singer/songwriters?

Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Steve Goodman, Bryan Adams, James Taylor, Van Morrison, Harry Chapin, Waylon Jennings and Johnny Cash.

Paddy Moloney: Of all our collaborations, I've enjoyed most Van Morrison. He's chaotic and has a reputation for being difficult. It's the Irish in him. But he's a genius. We have all the falling-outs you hear about. But to me he's still the best.

Ben Sidran: What’s Van Morrison like to collaborate with in the studio?

He’s exactly as he appears to be onstage. He never does anything the same way twice. Everything put down in the studio is done live, so whatever you play will likely end up on the finished record.

Billy Corgan (Smashing Pumkins): “You no longer have [institutions] to tell you what has more value," he said. "Growing up, I wasn’t necessarily a fan of Van Morrison, but I knew Van Morrison was an important artist just by the way he was talked about, by the way he was portrayed, by the way he was photographed. You don’t get that any more.

Robert Pattinson: Fandango: If you had a chance to collaborate with any music artist, who would it be?

I saw Van Morrison last night at the Hollywood Bowl. I've seen him five times before and he really pulled it out of the bag. He played like it was 30 years ago. I would love to do something with him now. He was my inspiration for doing music in the first place. Yes, he's still got it. He played the entirety of his album Astral Weeks. The whole thing was unbelievable. He was just as free as he was when he was younger, which was amazing.

Ken Bruen: Ken Bruen’s November 2008 Playlist

9) Philosopher’s Stone, Van Morrison. The aching in every line is bittersweet belief. Makes me want to rewrite my thesis for my doctorate.

Robert Pattinson: Interviewer: Tamara asked what is your favorite rock band?

Rob: I really like Van Morrison

Steve Van Zandt: “You accept Van Morrison as a native son right?’ he says.

“‘Gloria’ has become the co-national anthem of garage rock along with ‘Louie Louie’. As obstreperous as he can be, in spite of himself, he’s become quite a hero. I consider Them the archetype garage band actually, there’s been some controversy about who played on the record, but we tend to ignore those things. And he hasn’t been very helpful in that regard!”

Was Van much of an influence on the E Street Band in the early days?

“As a solo artist? Yeah, when I first knew Bruce we were listening to Astral Weeks and things like that. It became an early influence that would surface from time to time, it was one of those things that stayed quite deep in the DNA. At first it was the garage thing, and then he had a certain sort of singer-songwriter poetry sort of impact, and then he had a very significant R&B impact. So he had a very significant influence in at least three areas, and that remains I think with Bruce to this day.”

Eric Alterman: Eric Alterman’s October 2008 Playlist:

1) Comfortably Numb, Van Morrison with the Band. Like a coma, but in a good way … Pink Floyd’s version of this great song is hypnotic. Van Morrison can be hypnotic as well, but in a completely different way. Come to think of it, so can the Band. Roger Waters’ live version of “The Wall is mostly a disaster but this song has my permission to go on forever. Make sure you listen to that version, and not the truncated one that Marty Scorsese used for “The Departed” and Van put on his movie collection.

Richard Gere: Richard, besides going Paddy for The Jackal back in '97, you have been known to make Van Morrison laugh -- just wanted to say, the good people of Ireland have never actually seen that phenomenon, so thank you.

RG: Pleasure.

DL: Is that true, or just a rumour? He laughed?

RG: I played with him several times, and it was some of the most fun I've ever had in my life.

DL: That sounds great.

And what does Van Morrison look like when he's smiling?

RG: He gets taller. He gets a lot taller.

John Anderson (ESPN): What is your favorite kind of music genre and band?
Of the 1000 songs I have on my I-Pod 847 of them are by Van Morrison.

Foy Vance: You have been compared to Van Morrison, how does that feel? Good, I guess. Early Van Morrison is wonderful - he's a living legend. He has given so much to music in general, on the world scene as well as putting Belfast on the map.

Tim Russert: Favorite musicians: Van Morrison and Bruce Springsteen. Every song, every album. My taste hasn’t changed in 25 years, and when I’m preparing for Meet the Press, that music is playing in the background.

Miriam O'Callaghan: Her dream interview would be with musician Van Morrison."I prefer to concentrate on homegrown people and I have a great passion for Van Morrison's music, so he would definitely top my wish-list," she admitted.

"I think he's a really talented musician and a very interesting person -- so I'd love to get him on the show and get to find out what makes him tick.""I know a lot of people say that he's grumpy, but I'd love to have a chat with him and get behind that exterior.

"Even if he came on just to play a song, I'd be very happy."But ever the realist, Miriam conceded: "To be honest, I think it's very unlikely."

Rebecca Walker (Author): Into the Mystic, by Van Morrison. I heard this in the movie “Immediate Family” in 1989. I was 22 and in love. I ran to the now closed Tower Records on Broadway to buy the CD, which ushered in a long Van Morrison period in my life. This song about a man at sea returning to his love makes me weep.

Hal Ketchum: He said he was most influenced by Van Morrison, the Irish singer who delves into rock, soul, blues, R&B, jazz, gospel and country.

“Van is so open-minded about his music,” Ketchum said. “He lets it come to him. He’s a consummate singer, a great player, and he puts great bands together. He was a major influence in my life.”

Laura Dave (author): What is better than Van Morrison’s “Astral Weeks?”

My favorite track from this 1968 album makes a prominent appearance in “The Divorce Party.” (It comes toward the end of the book, so I’ll keep which song a secret.) I’ve also been listening to the title song a lot lately. It is quirky, original, and sweetly hopeful. And it speeds up, just in time, to find its near-perfect rhythm. It feels like spring to me.

Jaymay: The greatest album, ever?Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks. I listened to it for a year non-stop. It’s like one long song or a long dream or a long trip on a train through Italy in the rain.

Larry Kirwan: In your opinion, is there one album that defines rock and roll?

LARRY: No. But my own favorite album continues to be "Astral Weeks" by Van Morrison, even though, for a reason, I can no longer listen to it.

Kim CattRall: I love listening to anything by the Beatles in the summer," says the Sex and the City star. "Van Morrison is a favorite, too – I love 'Brown Eyed Girl!'

Johnny Depp: I remember listening to Frampton Comes Alive! too much. My brother's ten years older than me.

He grabbed the needle off the album and there was this horrific noise — wrrrraarrrar. He said, "Listen, man, you're killing me. Try this." And he put on Van Morrison's Astral Weeks. And it stirred me. I'd never heard anything like it. I said, "OK, maybe Frampton Comes Alive! is a little tired."

Dan Fogelberg: Is it true you were a sideman for Van Morrison in your early career?

No, that's not the truth. I never worked for Van Morrison. I did however, open several concerts for Van and his band in 1971. My manager at the time, Irving Azoff was working for a booking agency that booked Van Morrison, so he sent me out with my guitar to open his shows solo. Generally it was me, Dan Hicks and the Hot Licks and thenVan and his band. Strange show, but somehow it seemed to work.

David Gray: "My heroes are people like Van Morrison, John Martyn and Nick Drake, and there are some of my songs where these influences are fairly apparent."

Ray Charles: "They asked me to come to New York to help celebrate Van's induction into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

I went because I see Van as one of the cats that has kept the faith. Like me, he's always himself—he stays true to the music that means the most to him. It meant a lot to sing `Crazy Love' on stage with Van that evening. That's what you hear at the end of Genius Loves Company, me and Van live."'

Maura O'Connell: Deserted-island discs

1. Poetic Champions Compose, Van Morrison.

This was the first Vanalbum that I felt connected to. I was about 19, so it came out duringa seminal time in my life.

Ronan Keating: What do you listen to these days?

RK: I've been listening to a lot of Van Morrison – both old and new.He's got an awesome voice, and it's amazing how he's never faded withage. Of the newer bands, I like Train and Coldplay.

Tom Jones: "If you're doing something Van understands and likes, he's great,"Jones says. "And if the musicians are playing the way he wants them to play, he's great. But if there's a fly in the ointment he justwalks away. He didn't like the drummer on the session so he said, 'I want you to change places with the percussionist.'

So the drummer changed places with the percussionist and the percussionist played drums, and Van didn't like him either. Instead of trying to explain to these drummers what he did want, he walked out of the studio."Jones continues, "I said to the guy that handles him, 'What now? What are we going to do now?' He said, 'Van doesn't like these drummers,so we have to send to London for a drummer he knows and then we'll have another go at it.'

The session was at Van's studio in Bath, so we had to wait about four or five hours to get this drummer from London. But once Van heard him play and it gelled, he was good as gold."

"The collaborations were just incredible. I went to Van and he wastotally for it as long as we did it on one of his songs ['SometimesWe Cry'], which was totally fine by me. Just to sing with him, what a thrill."

Terry George: Tongue in cheek, George recounted how he has finally become famous in his homeland. Last February, along with another Belfast boy, Van Morrison, George was honored at the second annual “Oscar Wilde: Honoring Irish Writing in Film” event in Los Angeles.

“I was shocked that Van showed up because he’s notoriously shy, and he had a 12-piece band with him and proceeded to blow the hall away.” George recalled. “Word gets around back home and I’m hearing from my mother and brother and others back in Ireland telling me, ‘Terry, you’ve made it - you were on stage with Van Morrison!’”

Pete Doherty: ...launching into his very best Kate Moss impression, 'She was like "You know what actually I don't think that goes there very well, and that line doesn't work and na na na".

"So I'd just keep the peace really", he continued, "You just change the odd line, take suggestions. I think she was listening to a lot of Van Morrison at the time, that song 'The Way Young Lovers Do' and something about Utah and a pair of red shows. So yeah, that's her contribution."

It seems however that Doherty's memory of that period of time may just be a tiny bit hazy as it's Van Morrison's 'Astrals Track' which references red shoes, and 'Natalia' which contains the lyrics 'You Talk'.

John Bell (Widespread Panic): THE EAR: Who are your musical influences? What are your favorite albums or CDs?

BELL: At home, I listen to the whole Van Morrison catalog. I always have my ear peeled for new Van Morrison stuff that comes out. He’s so prolific; he puts out a new album every six months so. I feel lucky to get to be a fan and not be picking his songs apart for song structure, a pitfall that comes with being a musician.I’ve never seen Van Morrison live, but at the end of our last tour, we missed him by one day when he played Atlanta. If it had been a day earlier, I’d have been there.

Jenna Bush: She (Laura Bush) loves music. My dad (President Bush) does, too. And Van Morrison, I mean, they both love Van Morrison.

Nick Lowe: What's amazing, he says, is "I always think that that song (Peace, Love & Understanding) was the first actual original idea that I had. Up till then, I'd been figuring out how to write songs, and, really, I was still rewriting the Band's tunes or Van Morrison's tunes, whoever I thought was really good back then, because that's how anybody starts: You copy the people you admire."

Glen Hansard: Hansard told me they shot the entire film ("Once") in 17 days, and in it he played street versions of several Van Morrison songs. Hansard had met and chatted with Morrison in the past (pictured below), and didn’t feel he’d have a hard time getting permission to use them.

But when he called Morrison’s people to ask for permission, he got a one word answer: No!“But does he know it’s for me, Glen Hansard? The one he chatted with? The one from The Frames?” Hansard pleaded. “Yes, he knows exactly who you are,” the assistant replied. “He knows all that, and he still says no, even though you probably already shot them, didn’t you?”Hansard was crestfallen.

They had indeed already shot the scenes with Morrison’s songs, and there was no money or time to reshoot. His only option was to call back again and beg.After several minutes of groveling, Morrison himself got on the phone. “Of course you can use the songs!” he said. He was just toying with Hansard.

Interestingly enough, those songs didn’t make it into the film’s final cut.But a soulful version of "Into the Mystic" did make it into the concert Hansard and Irglova (pictured above) played for us last night at the Landmark.

Brian Kennedy: Kennedy began his music career combining work as a solo artist with a five-year stint backing another Belfast boy, Van Morrison, in the 1990s.

It was through that association that he first became acquainted with Best, the '60s star of Manchester United and one of the greatest soccer players of all time."I knew him a little bit because any time I played Manchester with Van, George would show up," he says.

"There were a couple of occasions when me and Van and George would end up having a drink together at the hotel. Being around that and listening to these two legends, who were roughly the same age and both from east Belfast ... that was a great privilege, just to sit there and listen to them."

Bap Kennedy: "I've known Van since he took an interest in my first band, EnergyOrchard, in the late 1980s," he explains."Being fellow Belfast lads, we got talking and he said 'Do you fancy writing a song together?'"

Needless to say, I said yes, so we got the acoustic guitars out,threw a lot of lines at each other and, 20 minutes later, there was the song. "Wasn't it a bit scary working with one of your heroes though?"Not at all," he says, laughing at the memory. "Basically, we were just two guys sitting together writing a song."

Julia Stiles: "When I was little, every Sunday my mom would play St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it.

My favorite track is Redwood Tree St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it. My favorite track is Redwood Tree St. Dominics Preview while cleaning the house... it had a great album cover of a blue church & Van sitting in front of it... I stole the record from her and put it on my wall.Recently I bought the cd and can't stop listening to it. My favorite track is Redwood Tree with the line "Oh Redwood Tree, please let us under..." - very comforting."

Eric Clapton: "Q: Did you enjoy “The Last Waltz” [the Band’s farewell concert in 1976, in which Clapton, Bob Dylan and a host of greats performed]?

A: I did, yeah. A fantastic event. I loved it... For me, Muddy [Waters] and Van [Morrison] steal the show. Van doing [“Caravan”] with the leg kicks. Some of the greatest live music you’ll ever see.

Sinead O'Connor: "'Beside You' is Morrison talking to his girlfriend, but you wouldn't realise that until the end. There are many versions of this song but the TB Sheets version is my personal favourite.

It's typical of his style lyrically, a stream of consciousness. He's a great storyteller - this one starts with: "Little Jimmy's gone way out of the backstreet, out of the window through the fallin' rain", and it soon becomes very hypnotic. Really, he's telling her that a million things might happen and a long time might pass but he'll always be there beside her.

The line I never forget is: "The dynamo of your smile reflects the barefoot virgin child." I never heard Van until I was 18 and I'd moved to London and this guy from a record company gave me his records. The thing I like about his early stuff is that they only have two chords, but you wouldn't know it because of how he plays and his voice.

Dr. John ('77): With Van, I just think he’s a hell of a singer. He’s an amazing singer considering he’s from Ireland and all of this, that he sounds like he’s from West Memphis, Arkansas or something. I think the cat is phenomenal!He’ll do some more classic records I’m sure in his time. He’s gonna have plenty, plenty product that’ll be fantastic.

Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell: Mayor of Nashville Bill Purcell recently made local music legend Van Morrison an honorary citizen of the American city. During a visit to Belfast last week he told how Morrison was " appreciative" of the accolade, but not exactly "chatty"!

"I found him communicative, appreciative and very pleased to be in Nashville," said Mr Purcell."But chatty would not describe Van Morrison," he joked.

Tim Finn: “We maybe do one or two of our own, but we’ll mostly do The Beatles or songs like ‘Wild Thing.’

We do a Van Morrison song called ‘The Irish Heart Beat,’ which we sang at our mother’s funeral. That’s getting to be a popular request.

Marty Whelan (RTE TV): Whelan had to find all the strength he could when his dear old dad died on August 11, 1998. "I miss him terribly," he tells me. When his father died, Marty played the Enlightenment album by Van Morrison (another only child) all day and night to help him get through it. He always took solace in Morrison's music and quiet contemplation.

He even recited See Me Through as a verse by Van Morrison at his dad's funeral...Ten days after his dad's funeral, Marty was presenting the Rose Of Tralee - and Van was a guest on the show. The singer came back to the hospitality room and Marty says he thinks he "bored" Van for an hour.

They sat and talked about being only children."It was one of the most special meetings that I ever had with anybody. I have never forgotten it. I am a respecter of his enormous ability to make me feel a whole range of emotions.

I told him about how his music had got me through the death of my father."Marty reflects for a moment. "The interesting thing Van said at the end of the conversation was [adopts gruff Van voice]: 'You're not a bit like I thought you'd be.'"

Brian Williams (NBC News): To fellow Sopranos fans:

I don't know what's left to say, but I'm not going to give up that easily: how about "Comfortably Numb?" That version with Van Morrison from The Departed soundtrack is, as a friend of mine put it, "Like being in Church." It's a transforming song -- perhaps among the top three Van Morrison recordings of all time.

More Here

2012-01-24T10:24:00.004Z

Astral Weeks Live: A Fan's Notes

In November 2008, singer Van Morrison launched the year of Astral Weeks Live, performing the songs from his critically acclaimed 1968 album Astral Weeks. The year began with two shows at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on November 7 and 8, 2008, and ended 12 months later at the MGM Grand in Connecticut. Twenty-three shows in all, the fans were treated to a musical experience of a lifetime.

This is the story of that year, from the fans’ perspective. Follow one fan’s road trip that takes her to Los Angeles, New York and places in between, on an unprecedented and unparalleled listening journey. Culled from her concert reviews, blog posts, and discussions with the fans, the book describes the year of Astral Weeks Live through her journal entries and notes from the road. And much more, including essays on the eight songs that make up Astral Weeks.

Astral Weeks Live: A Fan's Notes is available from followshannon.com

Shannon Vale will be doing a reading of her Astral Weeks Live: A Fan's Notes at 8:30 pm Feb 2 at the Pavilion, 296 Ormeau Road, Belfast.

A book signing at 11 am Feb 2 at the Espresso East cafe, 395-405 Newtownards Road, East Belfast.

2012-01-19T13:14:00.017Z

18-January-2012
St. James's Palace, London, England

Telegraph (SOURCE)

Van Morrison plays at St James's Palace

Van Morrison, watched by Martin McGuinness, gave a concert at St James's Palace to promote the culture and landscape of Northern Ireland.

Van Morrison has played his share of different venues in nearly 55 years as a musician but performing in the magnificent Picture Gallery State Room at St James's Palace must have been one of the most memorable.

Morrison was the star guest at an evening to promote Northern Ireland - as a thriving cultural location and a tourist destination.

Eamon Holmes Who Say

It was a fascinating evening all round. This is a new age for Northern Ireland and it was summed up by the sight of Sinn Féin's Martin McGuiness, the present deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, walking through the magnificent Armoury Room in the home of the royal family since the 1530s.

Belfast-born Morrison, a world-class musician, was introduced by Eamonn Holmes as 'Van The Legend Man' and the singer was in great form. John Peel once described Morrison as "a short man with a face like a member of the post-war Labour Government, all unforgiving eyes and down-turned mouth, radiating solemn purpose."

The solemn purpose was definitely there but the eyes were hidden behind the John Lee Hooker-style dark shades and black hat, a look Morrison has sported for the past decade.

Backed by a seven-man band - including a brass section with trumpet, trombone and saxophone - 66-year-old Morrison looked to be struggling with a cold but, fortified by puffs of his inhaler, he gamely sang and played saxophone and harmonica. His nine-song set included crowd-pleasing classics such as Moondance, Brown Eyed Girl, Gloria and Here Comes The Night but the highlights were a punchy version of Precious Time, a rollicking bluesy take on Big Joe Williams's Baby Please Don't Go and a fast-paced revival of the Sonny Boy Williamson song Help Me. With a nod to his homeland, the man known in the 1970s as The Belfast Cowboy also sang, at quite a canter, the old Irish ballad Star Of The County Down.

Among those who gave Morrison a standing ovation was Simon Callow. The actor, who had studied at The Queen's University Of Belfast, was described as an "honourary Irishman" and he gave a delightful reading on behalf of his old friend and former tutor Seamus Heaney. The poet from County Derry, who won the Nobel Prize For Literature in 1995, is now 72 and in his absence Callow read aloud Heaney's exquisite poemThe Peninsula:

The glazed foreshore and silhouetted log.

That rock where breakers shredded into rags,

The leggy birds stilted on their ow legs,

Islands riding themselves out into the fog.

Perhaps the most eloquent moment of the evening was provided by Music Theatre 4 Youth. St James's Palace houses Mortlake tapestries ordered by Charles I and a range of Royal portraits from the time of Henry VIII, including works by Mytens, Van Somer and Wissing but the positive message from the musical youngsters was that history needn't weigh us down. The future can be brighter.

Watched by First Minister Peter Robinson, Christine Bleakley and Barry McGuigan they sang Be The Change, written by Musical Director Tim Sutton as a tribute to Vernon Mound, who did so much to encourage youngsters from the region before his death from cancer.

It's an exciting time for Northern Ireland. The Irish Open golf will be held at Royal Portrush this year and the Titanic Belfast, the world's largest Titanic visitor experience which opens on 31 March, will attract crowds from all over the globe.

As Van The Man once sang: From the dark and lonely street. To the bright side of the road.

-Martin Chilton

Update: https://twitter.com/#!/MartinChilton
@vanmorrisonnews Thanks for posting Van Morrison article. The other song he did, by the way, was Real Real Gone #vantheman

2012-01-10T15:46:00.010Z

09-January-2012 Culloden Hotel, Belfast, Northern Ireland

Setlist
Instrumental
Brown Eyed Girl
Playhouse
Talk Is Cheap
Precious Time
Fair Play
Moondance
All In The Game
Little Village
Keep Mediocrity At Bay
Tupelo Honey
Have I Told You Lately
Baby Please Don't Go
Here Comes The Night
Gloria
Help Me

2012-01-09T15:44:00.013Z

08-January-2012 Culloden Hotel, Belfast, Northern Ireland

J. Stephens' review
This was the second night of the run and the organizers moved the dancing area off to the side instead of directly in front of the stage where it was the prior night. This gave everyone in the room a great view and probably helped to keep people focused on the music. I had come down from my room in the hotel to the banquet room the night before to get a preview of the scene, and could hear the loud laughing and talking over the music even before going in. Had I been in my formal attire, I think I probably could have just walked in since no one seemed to be checking tickets - OK, I admit I did go in for part of the rock-and-roll oldies portion of Saturday's set and lingered in the back until I got spotted by someone who looked official (I think my jeans and sweater gave me away)..

When I had seen that our evening was to start with champagne at 6 pm followed by dinner, and then the show at 9:00, I thought time would just drag on until the music started. Wrong. Between getting to know the people at our table, trying to find the other list members who I had never even seen before, and making an unplanned trip back to my room (more about that in a minute), the time flew by.

When we finished our meal and they were clearing the tables, the wife of the aforementioned friend of the hotel guy leaned over to me and whispered, "My husband and his friend are going to go meet Van after the show and maybe get an autograph." Followed by, "You should go with them - what do you have for him to sign?" It just so happens that the event organizer had left a little gift for me in my hotel room to apologize for a (inconsequential) mix up regarding the tickets - two VM CDs marked "Not for Sale - Promotional Copy". THAT is what I wanted him to sign. I looked at my watch - 7 minutes before 9:00. It's a good thing the hallways and stairs were empty. Six and one half minutes later I got back JUST as the music started.

I've seen the set lists posted already, and you know about him struggling with a cold for the first few songs. I think he hit his stride about 3-4 songs in. The sound was terrific. The band was spot on (as always). And Van appeared to be in great form . He seemed to actually be in a really good mood. Plus the crowd was very respectful and attentive. It all made for a very enjoyable show. A good set list, but a great performance.

Just as Van left the stage during Help Me (the last song), and everybody stood up for an ovation, the guys from my table signaled "Let's go!" So we did. Out to the back of the hotel where Van's silver BMW was the only car parked. We thought we made a mistake when there was no action even after 15 minutes. Just then, out he comes with his "handler" (I have no idea who the other guy was, I just call him that). Dressed in a brown leather jacket, driving cap, and scarf, Van seemed fine with saying hello, and even signing something for each of the three of us. Then he was off. My first meeting with Van the Man. In Belfast, no less. Five minutes from his home. A perfect ending to a perfect night.
-J. Stephens

Setlist
Celtic Excavation
Talk Is Cheap
Playhouse
Precious Time
Ordinary Life
Fair Play
Keep Mediocrity at Bay
Have I told you Lately
I Cant Stop Loving You
Brown Eyed Girl
Moondance
Crazy Love
Little Village
Baby, Please Dont Go
Here Comes The Night
Gloria
Help Me

2012-01-08T18:41:00.004Z

07-January-2012 Culloden Hotel, Belfast, Northern Ireland

Pic tweeted by Golfer Darren Clarke who was at the gig

Trevor was one of the lucky few to see Van's charity gig at the Culloden Hotel in Belfast:

As you’d expect, right on time at 21.00, Van and band walked on stage. There followed one and a half hours of superb performance. Although it was clear early in the set that Van was struggling vocally, he shone through to perform an extraordinary set. Normally I’m used to Van’s audience sitting or standing concentrating on Van’s every word and move, but on this occasion it was bizarre watching the antics of dancers directly in front of the stage, but soon we joined them to get up close to the 2 ft high stage upon which Van’s 7 piece band rocked and rolled.

It was a very memorable occasion.

Set list (as I recall)
Baby please don’t go
Here comes the night
Brown Eyed Girl
Higher than the world
Did you get healed
Have I told you lately
I can’t stop loving you
Real real gone
You send me
So Complicated (inst)
R’n’R Jam including
Bright Lights Big City
Kansas City
Shake rattle and roll
Blue suede shoes
And more………………..
Help Me

It was a very memorable occasion.

2011-12-30T22:51:00.000Z

Van Photo Of The Day

Mid 70s

2011-11-28T22:04:00.039Z

New UK Dates Announced For February & March 2012

4 more shows in UK theatres early next year:

Feb 11 – The Sage, Gateshead
Feb 12 – Barbica, York

Mar 3 – Brighton Dome
Mar 4 – Bournemouth Pavilion

Ticket pre sale is only being advertised at vanmorrison.com and is available from 9am Wednesday 30 November at http://www.ticketline.co.uk/van-morrison

Source: Van Morrison Newsletter www.vanmorrison.com

2011-11-13T15:11:00.003Z

12-November-11 Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, England

Thanks to James T for sending in setlist & his review:

So it had been 4 years since I had seen VM perform at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester and I remember that it was quite a lackluster affair. I have very fond memories meeting up with Dan Murray and having a good chat with him and other Fans after the show.

4 years later VM had brought us Astral Weeks Live, a news scandal, a year long absence from the scene and just recently some UK shows. Birmingham, Liverpool (which I attended), Bristol and Cardiff. Van was due to play in Blackpool on the Friday night but for whatever reason the show was cancelled! The jury is still out on that one! So how would Van play on this chilly night in Manchester?

The simple answer: very well!

The band was noticeably more relaxed and tighter than Liverpool and Van was leading them in a very positive way. His arm movements were clear and direct; there was little confusion of who was in charge!

The set list was very similar to recent shows so I won’t go in to too much detail.

The highlights were:

Jay Berliner – what an amazing guitarist, he really lifts VM game and the whole band responds to him. His frantic style and technique is awesome to behold. VM keeps him on his toes – at point Jay repeated a technique and Van stared at him blankly as if to say “yeah, you already did that earlier!” Jay responded with another brilliant improvisation. Vans face cracked a smile. A Lovely moment!

Fair Play – another early stretch out – a great showcase for the band, all members getting solos. The show took off from this point.

The Mystery – great to hear this live. I would have liked Van to have built the vocal more but his singing was forceful from the very beginning.

I Can’t stop loving you – A surprise, although there have been better versions. This was very welcome and the crowd responded well.

All in the game – there has been much discussion about the mantra at the end of recent versions of this song. Hats off to Van, he did it again! I didn’t think it was possible after Liverpool’s relentless performance clocking in at nearly 12 minutes. Well this was equally jaw dropping and the pinnacle of tonight’s performance for me. No plan B – No safety net. Brilliant to hear this new material – will it end up on an album? Fingers crossed!

In the Garden – Sheer magic! Nuff said!

Help me – No encore tonight but I wasn’t surprised as Van must have started this song after the 90 minutes anyway. This was an intense and souring version which left the band to wrap up with a rousing and loud finish.

Lowlights – The audience was up and down like Yo-yos – do these people have money to burn?

I don’t personally care about the cost. As long as Van continues I will try to see him live. He has well and truly proved that he’s still got it!

-James T.

Setlist

Baby, Please Don't Go

Here Comes The Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Higher Than The World

Magic Time

The Mystery
Fair Play

Real Real Gone

I Cant Stop Loving You
Crazy Love

Young Lovers Do
Moondance

All In The Game

In The Garden

Ballerina

Into The Mystic

Help Me

2011-11-07T16:16:00.000Z

2011-11-02T17:52:00.005Z

Van Morrison Adds Belfast & Dublin Shows in February 2012

03-February-12 Odyssey Arena
Belfast, N. Ireland
With Special Guest: Shana Morrison

04-February-12 The O2
Dublin, Ireland
With Special Guest: Shana Morrison

Check vanmorrison.com for the latest updates.

2011-09-23T21:47:00.008+01:00

23-September-2011 St. David's Hall, Cardiff, Wales

South Wales Echo
With a reputation for unpredictability that precedes him like the proverbial elephant in the room, you’re never quite sure what sides of the enigmatic but glacial Northern Irish musical legend you’re about to encounter in the live arena.

Van the Man had already got tongues wagging by charging a £100 top ticket price for his Cardiff show, seemingly unfathomable in an area mired firmly in recession.

As a result there were a fair few gaps in the auditorium, although it has to be said the most expensive seats were full of Morrison aficionados urging on their hero.

Dressed in trademark hat and shades, the iconic tunesmith didn’t utter a single word to the audience throughout the show.

But then I guess with songs as great as his, he can let the music do the talking.

And what a set he delivered.

Opening with a lithe, freeform version of Moondance, the ‘70s classic set the standard for all that was to come.

Stood behind a mic stand which bore his only concession to rock ‘n’ roll ego – the gold letters V and M – he took us and his hugely-skilled seven-piece band on an exhaustive 100-minute run through his glittering back catalogue.

Van’s players orchestrated his sublime work with the verve and interpretative skills of a jazz outfit as the maestro changed the direction of songs with a mere flick of his hand, while his band played on their nerves and their talent to mine a rich groove at their master’s request.

It was an unforgettable evening choc full of his greatest compositions. Brown Eyed Girl, Real Real Gone, Have I Told You Lately That I Love You, In The Garden, Ballerina and an especially sumptuous Little Village all wore the rosy glow of the warmest of hypnotic songwriting – a delicious collision of stunning soul, jazz, roots and blues.

A blistering Gloria brought proceedings spinning to a spellbinding close as we were left dazed and beautifully bruised by the experience.

So the iceman cometh and frankly he melted our hearts.
-Dave Owens

South Wales Argus

Van Morrison made a no frills enterance at 7.45 prompt,strapped on his sax and from the start, left the audience in no doubt as to who was running the show.

He directed his technically perfect seven-piece band with no more than a hand-movement, and from the first riveting notes of Moondance, to his finale,Gloria, when he made a James Brown, prompt exit with no encore we knew we were in the presence of a master.

What had come between those two songs two songs was something else. Indulging himself and his band and turning St David's Hall into an intimate jazz club, the set-list was nothing short of impressive.Hhe included Song of Home, Real Real Gone, Plan B, and of couse the classics, Crazy Love, Brown Eyed Girl and Have I Told You Lately The spiritual In the Garden was amazingly good, with Van just breathing into the microphone for over a minute whilst the band played on. An impromtu rant at Twitter and Facebook provided a tinmely extra verse to Talk is Cheap.

At 65, this is a man firmly at the top of his game, the concert was nothing less than extraordinary.

-Steven Healy

Ivo sent in this review

Something extraordinary happened in Cardiff yesterday after the ‘Finsbury Park band’ had taken the stage in front of a by far not sold out St. David’s Hall crowd, played a rather mediocre Moondance, and kicked off Higher Than The World (yes, Higher Than The World). Pure bliss filled the air, and that resulted some 50 minutes of musicianship of the absolute highest level, after which some 40 minutes of ‘just’ great music followed.

I’ve seen Van a couple of times over the past few years, and this was by far – and I mean by far – the best concert I’ve seen. Jay Berliner was back in town, and Van was clearly pleased with the way he played (Jeff Lardner and Paul Moran still got their fair share of comments along the way though).

Overall the band was very tight. It felt a bit like the jazz band Van had back in ’95, but this one is so together (a real band!) that it can take a song in any direction with the slightest of hand signals by Van. Ever heard Talk Is Cheap being whispered, with an extra verse about Facebook and Twitter? It happened yesterday. Ever heard Van just breathe for a minute, and nothing else, during In The Garden, while the band played on? It happened yesterday. And when Van says himself that it is too good to stop during Help Me, you know someone is having fun.

The absolute highlight of the evening, in my book, was You Know What They’re Writing About. Over six minutes of Van caressing, shouting, taking apart the (new?) sentences ‘It’s an assignment – There’s no plan B! No plan B!! No safety net!’, raising the level of intensity as he took them apart in very different ways, before moving to the regular ‘Meet me down by the river’ sequence.

This was a concert that demands to be heard. It was that freaking good! And … a very, very big hand for the band too. It’s the best Van has had in many a year.

-Ivo D

Setlist (Thanks To Mike S.)
Moondance
Higher than the World
Song of Home
Fair Play/Take It Where You Find It
Real Real Gone
All in The Game/You Get Your Assignment/No Plan B/No Safety Net/This is It (new material)
Talk is Cheap
Crazy Love
Little Village
In the Garden
St James Infirmary
Brown Eyed Girl
Have I Told you Lately
Ballerina
Help Me/Wanna Rock That Boat/Too Late To Stop Now
Gloria

2011-09-22T22:18:00.003+01:00

22-September-2011 Colston Hall, Bristol, England

Long-time Van fan Pat wrote a great review on his excellent blog
Van came on stage and he has dispensed with the suit which is good and was wearing a real bad boys tight leather jacket. The opening song was MOONDANCE and i was happy to see the great Jay Berliner back on guitar with Vans band of Paul Moran on keyboards piano and trumpet, Paul Moore on bass Jeff Lardner drums Chris White sax, flute Alistair White trombone and Dave Keary on guitar. It was a nice surprise to hear HIGHER THAN THE WORLD next from Van's Inarticulate Speech Of The Heart album and Jay excelled himself with some mesmerising guitar playing. Read the rest of review here.

Setlist (Thanks Mike S.)
Moondance
Higher Than The World
Song of Home
Fair Play
In the Garden
Magic Time
Its All in The Game
Real Real Gone
Talk is Cheap
Crazy Love
Ballerina
Can't Stop Loving You
Little Village
Help Me /It's Too Late to Stop Now
Gloria

2011-09-04T02:50:00.006+01:00

03-September-11 Empire Theatre, Liverpool, England

Liverpool Echo

VAN Morrison is certainly no Ken Dodd. Given what I’ve heard about his showmanship, so to speak, I fully expected him to come on stage, insult the audience and then sit with his back to us and play a set of songs off that dreaded ‘new album’ for 10 minutes and then walk off.

But no, Van the man, famed for his grouchiness and seeming antipathy towards his fans, was actually on relatively good form for his Empire gig on Saturday night.

Granted, he hardly spoke, but at least knew what everyone had come for and didn’t disappoint, playing some of the more famous of his songs from his 40-odd year career.

Here Comes the Night, one of his earliest hits with Them, opened up the action, with its anthemic, Rolling Stones-esque chorus. So far, so good – and he hadn’t walked off in a huff yet.

The band were stunning, a wonderful seven piece ensemble with piano, guitar, double bass, drums and brass section, as well as Morrison himself chipping in on sax and mouth organ.

The mood was laid back, and nearly every song took on a loungey, jazzy tone, including the wonderful Crazy Love, which moved along slowly, gently, like waves lapping up against a shore.

Similarly, Into The Mystic, washed over the 1,300-strong crowd like an incoming tide.

I had been afraid Morrison would go out of his way to play things no-one wanted to hear, the way Dylan sometimes does, but no: He even belted out Moondance itself, that wonderful jazz blues pastiche which I’ll forever associate with the film American Werewolf in London.

There were plenty of dewy eyes when he turned out Have I Told You Lately That I Love You, which was undoubtedly one of the biggest favourites of the show.

His voice was on fine form: That rambling, trademark Irish drawl, interspersed with high pitched wails and the odd bit of scat thrown in. This was, as much as anything, a jazz gig, and with such a tight, albeit restrained, band behind him, all the songs seemed to melt into one, yet each retaining their own distinct flavours that made them hits in their own right.

I think at one point, he may actually have spoken to the audience, but it was unintelligible.

But it didn’t matter – the audience was in the grip of a master, a master who, despite his best efforts to make it look to the contrary, almost seemed like he was enjoying himself.

9/10: Still the man

-Marc Waddington

James Tennant sent in the following review

After walking all the way down Dale Street in search of The Ship and Mitre pub, I quickly realised that we had been walking completely in the wrong direction! So it was with great desperation that I ordered my friend and I a much deserved pint and headed over to the corner to meet up with the many fans that had come to see Van Morrison perform at the Empire Theatre.

Discussions were positive about the previous concert in Birmingham and it seemed Van had delivered a good show. It was wonderful to meet everyone, what a great bunch of people they were! Stories were told and photos taken but it was soon time to start checking the watches and make our way over to the theatre.

The last time I had seen Van in Liverpool was in 2004 and I felt that the band had really hit their groove at that point. Van was very relaxed and the show just flowed. I thought we could be in for a good one but then I heard an announcement. The front of house manager stated sternly that the show would finish at exactly 9.15pm! Oh dear – Vans got a plane to catch! This doesn’t bode well. My friend told me to stop being negative and get a grip. Let’s get a whisky instead!

After a wee drop we took out seats. We were on the very back row but still had a great view thanks to binoculars! Almost immediately the band entered, there was a brief pause and the riff for ‘Baby Please Don’t Go’ began, the audience cheered in recognition, the lights began to fade. The riff continued but by this time the audience had stopped cheering. Where was Van Morrison? We waited some more then all of a sudden he was on. He was in fine voice although it was clear that something was not right. Van turned to the bass player and instructed him to change to upright bass, which he did – Mid song!

Next was ‘Here comes the night’, another crowd pleaser. The band settled in to find the groove but Van was still not happy. His arm gestures were very jerky and aggressive towards the drummer and Van was looking towards his roadie.

‘Moondance’ followed and whilst van was singing and the band took their solos, the roadies moved the guitarist closer to Van. It was after this confusion that Van picked up the sax and began to explore the music as the song was brought to its finish.

Oh dear – This was not a good start.

Well as luck would have it, ‘Fair Play’ was next. This was just wonderful; it ebbed and flowed, the band just pulsing along. Probably not the best version ever but it quickly made it clear that if this band continues with Van, they could be brilliant.

‘Magic Time’, ‘Have I Told You Lately’ and ‘Crazy Love’ added more quality to the mix. Vans voice really started to loosen up and although at this stage Vans singing had felt quite muted, it struck me that the tone in his voice tonight was very intimate and personal. Almost as if Van was just singing to one person, At times throughout the concert Vans vocals were so fragile, he could have been speaking the lyrics.

‘Talk Is cheap’ and ‘Mediocrity’ broke the romance and added some much welcomed spark and a change of tempo. Van even added an expletive at one point; however I’m not quite sure for whose benefit it was for. Maybe it was for the drummer, who was continuing to bare the brunt of Vans frustration.

‘In The Garden” was simply breathtaking and for me the moment where Van got rid of his demons, got into the music and began to enjoy himself. The climax of this song was AMAZING. Van rushed the beginning of the song quickly and got down to the meditation which faded out so that only Vans intense vocal could be heard. This is one of the best fade outs I have witnessed live; it reminded me of the famous fade from Listen to The Lion on “It’s too late to stop now”

Well maybe Van had been listening to the CD before the show because those immortal words became the mantra at the end of the best live performance of ‘All In The Game’ I have ever heard. Again Van seemed to rush the opening verses but just as I thought he would wrap up the song……he continued. Going passed the pylons; he seemed to be on the river of no return. On and on, whispering, growling, screeching and the glorious band rose to the occasion building and building to such a peak. The crowd cheered and for that moment the audience, band and Van were totally in that glorious place where it ain’t why, it just is!

How could you come down from this? Simples…..’Celtic Excavation’ provided the perfect come down. ‘Into the mystic’ surprised the audience.

A chirpy ‘Real Real Gone’ segued into ‘You Send Me’.

‘Ballerina’ was another highlight where Van taught us even more about the power of dynamics. He led band to a whisper only to suddenly bring them back up with a rollicking funky finish! Brilliant! Sheer brilliance!

I was really surprised to hear Beautiful Vision. Another good version and a solid vocal from Van.

As we neared the 9.15pm curfew I hoped Van would throw away the rule book. Alas it was not to be! All good things must come to an end and a rather strange ending it was as Van rushed through ‘Help me’ and came back for ‘Gloria’, only to shout at Paul Moran for not playing long notes…..” Play…..Long Notes……..LONG NOTES……..CHORDS!”

So we were treated to a fractious Van Morrison in Liverpool, he was in deep battle with his slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Luckily we were left with some truly breathtaking music to remember!

-James Tennant

Alan O'Hare sent in the following review

It didn’t look good.

Empty seats dotted around, a medley opening the gig and a disinterested dance around Moondance. The sound was low too.

But then something happened.

Something that only occurs when Van Morrison is leading a band: magic in the night. The opening piano chords of Fair Play brought about a change and we were off…

The band picked up, Van sang with intensity and the song which opens Veedon Fleece so masterfully, stretched out into a joyful experience. Van twisted and turned the melody inside out and phrased “Geronimo” the way only he can.

The soundman must have picked up on the change of pace too, as all of a sudden the volume went up and the Liverpool Empire began to stir: Magic Time, Talk Is Cheap and Keep Mediocrity At Bay all got the old hall moving and it looked lime Van was starting to enjoy himself.

He moved the band closer together, pointed for solos and the night took off.

There were quirks too: calling for Crazy Love after Have I Told You Lately was mischievous; following the jazz-lounge couples favourite with a song that uses the same tricks but delivers so much more made me smile. It was a great version too.

As was All In The Game/You Know What They’re Writing About – with punchy horns, a funky tempo and fantastic singing from Van, overpowering it all with the vocals: “It’s too late to stop now…” he hollered towards the end to set spines tingling. Mind-blowing.

A new version of Into The Mystic followed with an extended horn intro and Van on the saxophone. It never really got going though, until the horns played that famous riff towards the end, whereas Real Real Gone and Ballerina were played pretty much straight and sounded much better for it.

Help Me was one too many blues on the night for this palette and Beautiful Vision didn’t really hit the spot but Gloria brought the house down to close.

Van Morrison’s singular vision remains and renders all discussions about his live performance redundant: it ain’t why, it just is.

And long may he run.

-ALAN O’HARE, SINGER WITH THE TRESTLES

LISTEN HERE: http://www.myspace.com/thetrestles

Setlist

Baby Please Don't Go

Here Comes The Night

Moondance

Fair Play

Magic Time

Have I Told You Lately

Crazy Love

Talk Is Cheap

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

In The Garden

All In The Game

Celtic Excavation

Into The Mystic

Real Real Gone->You Send Me

Ballerina

Beautiful Vision

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand For The Band!

Paul Moore

Chris White
Dave Cleary

Paul Moran

2011-09-02T23:25:00.009+01:00

02-September-11 Symphony Hall, Birmingham, England

Express & Star
Van the Man effortlessly performed almost two hours of mellow music infused with jazz, soul, R&B and blues.

Kicking off with a warmly embraced Moondance the Belfast Cowboy worked his way through his considerable back catalogue of songs with a highlight being his most famous hit Brown Eyed Girl.

Have I Told You Lately and Georgia were stand-out tracks from Van Morrison, while one surprising addition was a moving rendition of Unchained Melody.

With no trite between-song banter or vacuous small talk Van was content to let the music do the talking at last night’s concert, where top end ticket prices pushed £100.

His dexterity displayed on the guitar, saxophone and harp proved his true pedigree as a genuine living legend.

Setlist

Moondance

Fair Play

Magic time

All In the Game

Real Real Gone

In The Garden

Have I Told You Lately

Brown Eyed Girl

Into Th Mystic

Young Lovers Do

Georgia

St. James Infirmary

Ballerina

Unchained Melody

Gloria

Help Me

Big Hand For The Band

Paul Moore

Chris White
Dave Cleary
Paul Moran

2011-08-29T01:17:00.000+01:00

Van Photo Of The Day

San Francisco 1974

2011-06-20T13:45:00.021+01:00

19-Jun-11 Irish Feis - Finsbury Park, London, England

Petra sent theis review

Festival Day No. 2 started with promising sunshine – no wellies needed today. The muddy grounds had dried after yesterday’s rain, cleaned from millions of beer cups, and we were fit and eager for more music to come.

Jimmy Cliff was the first gig we joined in the afternoon – who said it’s an Irish festival. The reggae sounds brought a merry Caribbean feeling to Finsbury Park in sunshine – Jimmy and his band a sight for sore eyes with their Jamaican colored drums and costumes, Jimmy dressed all in gold.

The Irish band Clannad delivered smooth harp sounds and angelic singing (a bit boring to my opinion), but then we were woken up by honest and loud folk rock from the Horslips with great e-guitar playing – music legends in Ireland all of them.

But this is the Van Morrison News Blog and, of course, the main reason why we and so many other people traveled to London from far and near is Vantheman. We hadn’t seen him since his last concerts in Germany in 2008. Van gigs in Europe had become scarce after that, and his fans around the world were worrying if he would do any more gigs at all – the latest one was at the Royal Albert Hall in London in October 2010.

So anticipation was growing extremely for the Vanatics as the scheduled time for the Van gig came … Uwe and me were lucky to stand very close to the stage, together with Mike, Brian and Alan – good company. What would be the line-up of his new band ? Which song would be the starter... would he do a mere routine gig, grab his money and run... or a real good show which would show us that he’s back to the world?

Van was dressed in a black leather jacket and leather waistcoat, fedora and shades as usual. He seemed to be a bit annoyed with some technical issues in the beginning and I feared the worst. Would he turn round on his heel and leave the stage ? But here it came – probably the best of his gigs we joined, so far.

It was obvious from the start that Van not just meant to meet his contractual obligations as we had feared – he tried hard to deliver good quality and give his best. The band was probably not as tight as it could be – maybe they need quite a bit more rehearsals to be fit for the tour we all hope for … But with Jay Berliner playing a wonderful acoustic guitar and with a great horn section they are not far from being perfect. No harmony singers, no fiddle. The sound was beautiful where we stood - for a big event like this. The other musicians were (as far as I know - Van did not introduce the band members this time …): Alistair White on trombone, Chris White on sax, Paul Moore on upright bass, Paul Moran on keyboards and trumpet, Andy Jones (or was it Dave Keary ?) on electric guitar, Jeff Lardner on drums.

The show started with ‘Baby Please Don’t Go’ leading into ‘Here Comes The Night’ and ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ with Van playing sax and a great jazzy fade-out. Now we are through with the crowd pleasers and can focus on what really matters ... Quite smart of Van, I think. Normally the crowd shouts for the “hits” until they get them - what is annoying for everybody.

We were delighted to hear next ‘Fair Play’ from the sublime 1974 Veedon Fleece album. It faded into Van’s mumbled phrasing of ‘church bell chime’ and ‘are you there ?’.

Sounds promising – that’s exactly what we had hoped for … ‘ Real Real Gone’ was next, nice to hear this one again. ‘I Can’t Stop Loving You’ – beautiful. The inevitable ‘Moondance’ with Van and Chris on sax and Paul Moran playing a magnificent muted trumpet – a sublime version of the old standard. I began to look around and watch some faces in the audience around me. Many young people, some with Asian or African background, swaying to the music with an enchanted expression on their faces. Looks like Van is going to win over another audience generation for him …

‘Have I Told You Lately’ for once was not the awful fast Las Vegas version but sung slowly with a feeling, beautiful muted trumpet sound in the background. ‘Wavelength’ was next – never heard it live before ... ‘It’s All In The Game’ with Van playing sax again. And then a wonderful version of ‘In The Garden’ – had hoped so much to hear this one on our previous gigs years ago … This time ‘No Guru’ had an interesting lyric variation: Van sang ‘holy guardian angel’ instead of ‘holy ghost’, looking up into the bright blue evening sky when singing this line … I think listening to this wonderful song brought tears not only to my eyes … Then he murmured something like ‘Live is something completely different’ …

The only really Irish reminiscence was ‘Star Of The County Down’ getting great audience acclaim, of course. Maybe the most amazing song of this evening was his ‘Ballerina’ version ending up in an unusual rock rhythm – never heard that before.

The nightshirt in ‘Help Me’ with a harp playing Van is an indicator that the show comes to an end. A barn-storming ‘Gloria’ was last as usual – then it was done. No word to the audience – Van wanders off the stage, playing his harp while the band continues to play .. As always.

But Van seemed to be in good shape, good voice, played a lot of great sax solos and was quite obviously doing an effort to deliver a good concert. What he really did. We thought it was probably the best one of the 6 gigs we were lucky to witness, so far. Let’s hope this was the start of a new tour series … It’s Too Late To Stop Now, Van !!

-Petra

Bridgit's review
Van Morrison - second highlight of the day - entertaining concert, the right mix of fast sing-a-longs and some jazzier standards; started with "Baby please don't go" and ended with - well, of course "Gloria"; "Moondance" could have been longer, "Star of the County Down" had a jazzy touch (reminded me of the Montreux 1990 standard); no setlist here, I'm sure somebody else will provide it... the voice is as good as ever (even though he seemed to struggle). I got pretty much to the front - great sound there, happy people but even amongst the hardcore fans you couldn't get away from the noisy drunkards bumping into you.

PS: Later at the "Twelve Pins" Irish Bar right around the corner they had some fun live music, including yet another shalala Brown Eyed Girl. All these kids were happily dancing to it and singing along. And those I asked all said that their concert highlight of the weekend had been "Van the Man".
-Birgit

Setlist (Thanks To Jordi)

Baby Please Don't Go (Van on harp)

Here Comes The Night

Brown Eyed Girl (Nice new version with good horns)

Fair Play

Real Real Gone

I Can't Stop Loving You

Moondance (Few bars of My Funny Valentine)

Have I Told You Lately (Slightly new version of this classic)

Wavelength

All In The Game

In The Garden

Star Of The County Down

Ballerina

Help Me

Gloria

2011-06-16T03:23:00.000+01:00

Van Morrison Returns This Sunday

London Feis June 19, 2011

Photo: Norman Seeff

For line up details, tickets, announcements & news visit: www.londonfeis.com

2011-06-05T16:48:00.005+01:00

Your Favorite Van Albums 1980-1989

No Guru, No Method, No Teacher (1986) 32%

Poetic Champions Compose (1987) 21%

Common One (1980) 13%

Avalon Sunset (1989) 10%

Beautiful Vision (1982) 7%

Irish Heartbeat (1988) 4%

Live at the Grand Opera House Belfast (1984) 4%

A Sense of Wonder (1985) 3%

Inarticulate Speech of the Heart (1983) 2%

Over one thousand votes were recorded - thanks for participating!

Your Favorite Van Albums 2000-2009

Astral Weeks Live (2009) 38%

Magic Time (2005) 21%

Down The Road (2002) 16%

Keep It Simple (2008) 11%

What's Wrong With This Picture (2003) 6%

Pay The Devil (2006) 3%

The Skiffle Sessions (2000) 3%

You Win Again (2000) 2%

Over a thousand votes were recorded - thanks for participating!

2011-05-08T23:50:00.001+01:00

1981 Interview With Van

by Paul Vincent

From the February 12, 1982 issue of

BAM: The California Music Magazine (issue #123)

Originally Transcribed by David Chance For The van-the-man.info website

Van & Paul Vincent November 13, 1981

The following interview took place at KMEL-FM's San Francisco studios in mid-November of last year. Although we don't, as a rule, reprint radio interviews, we were so impressed by the rapport between Van and KMEL jock Paul Vincent that we thought it would be fun to share this rare glimpse of Van Morrison with our readers.

Paul Vincent: How different is it being Van Morrison the artist now as opposed to Van Morrison the artist in the '60s?

Van Morrison: I think now there's a lot less emphasis on art in the music business. It's completely different. When I started there were more people like me. Now there are fewer people doing creative stuff, writing songs or whatever.

PV: Is it difficult separating music from "the business"?

VM: Yeah it is, because the business is like a fixed system now. It's gotten that way because of econimics, I guess.

PV: How do you cope with that?

VM: Well, in some way you've got to compromise. If I really did what I felt I wanted to do, it might be sort of inaccessible because, for instance, when you make an album you end up with three-, four-, maybe five-minute songs, but when I actually just play with other musicians things stretch out much longer than that, so you have to edit it and re-shape it to make it accessible for people to "get it."

PV: "Summertime In England," from Common One, was originally thirteen minutes long, and the record company released an edit of that. Does that distress you when you hear your work edited?

VM: No. That's what I'm saying--you have to do that, 'cause at the pace we live in the world we live in, that's the way it's done.

PV: You play quite a bit in the Bay Area, but you haven't toured in a while. I can understand the negative aspects of touring, but there are also the positive aspects--the reaction you get from people in different cities, and so forth. Do you miss that at all?

VM: You see, for me it was more negative than positive. I take my involvement with music as a whole thing. I was telling somebody yesterday that this album I have coming out has taken me 21 years to make. It's not just an album, something I did months ago. I don't just take it as 1981 or 1982. I've been in it for 21 years, so it's taken me 21 years to get to this point. It's accumulated experience. Getting back to the going on the road thing--I started going on the road when I was 15, so by the time I was 21 I had had enough of touring. Before I even walked in a studio all I knew was touring, one-nighters.

PV: Do you see a time when you might just write and record and not tour at all? Miles Davis, for instance, just came out of a semi-retirement of seven years to do some gigs, and there are other examples of artists who write but don't perform.

VM: It's hard to say, because it depends on a combination of things. If you're happy with the band you've got and it's really happening, you can stand to do more gigs and combat staying in hotels. But also, the economic situation of touring is outrageous at the present time.

PV: You seem to be pretty pleased with the band you have now.

VM: That's why I've been doing some gigs. We just finished the album and it was time to say "goodnight," but I realized I haven't gotten off with a bunch of musicians like this in quite a while, so I wanted to keep it happening.

PV: Many of your songs are rather complex, intricately put together. How do you write? Do you have a musical idea first, or a lyrical idea?

VM: Well, there's "A," "B" and "C." "A" is where I get the whole idea, the lyrics and the melody to the song. That's inspirational writing, which is very rare. "B" is where I get a melody or have a melody I'm working on, and I later work on words to go with the melody and the chords. And "C" is the reverse of that.

PV: Do you write on the guitar or keyboards?

VM: Guitar and piano.

PV: Do you think about your audience at all when you're writing?

VM: Not really, because you can't think about anything when you're writing except that. It's like if you're a carpenter, you can't build a shelf well if you're thinking about who you're going to sell it to. You have to build the shelf first, and then whoever wants to buy it...

PV: Unfortunately, the reverse is usually true these days. Writing--and maybe even carpentry--is done with the audience in mind.

VM: See, I don't think of myself as "a songwriter." I know songwriters and I'm not one. A songwriter's a guy who can come in at 9:30 in the morning and write a song on demand, and I've never been able to do that. I'm an inspirational writer. I write when I'm inspired. If I'm not inspired I *can't* write. It's impossible for me. I'm not like a craftsman, which is what a songwriter is.

PV: There was a period of about three years, between Veedon Fleece ['74] and Period of Transition ['77], when you went back to Ireland for a while. Were you writing during that time? There was no album for about three years.

VM: There was a period there where I didn't write for about two-and-a-half years. I didn't do anything. I didn't play guitar, I didn't listen to music. I had overdosed. I had to stop. I had had enough. I was mentally exhausted, physically exhausted and I just had to get away from music completely. I'd been going at it hard for ten or twelve years.

PV: And then it all came around again and you got psyched up and ready to go back.

VM: I started to like it again. When I was taking the time off I hated it. I had a total aversion to everything about it.

PV: How planned are your live sets? They seem to be kind of structured as they go along.

VM: At this point they're planned, or more planned than they'd be if we just threw something together to play at a club. There are too many people for it not to be planned. There are seven musicians and three singers. The order of the songs isn't planned, though.

PV: Do you still enjoy performing your older music? Do you still enjoy playing "Gloria," or do you do it kind of for the sake of the audience?

VM: If I haven't done a song for a while and it's fresh, I enjoy it. I haven't done "Gloria" in quite a while so it is fresh. I don't take it seriously, though.

PV: You get a kick out of it, though, don't you? It's not drudgery.

VM: No, no, it's good. It's so old it's new, y'know?

PV: A lot of times in live performance you do great songs that weren't written by you: "Stand By Me," "Mona," "Not Fade Away," Sam Cooke's "You Send Me," some Jimmy Reed songs, some Willie Dixon songs, and "Buona Sera," a Louis Prima song which is really a kick. Do you have studio versions of any of these in a vault somewhere?

VM: There's a version of "Buona Sera" somewhere from a KSAN show. I went into the studio a couple of years ago and went through my old tapes. By the time you get through everything you realize it would be better to do it fresh than get hung up on old tapes.

PV: The flipside of "Joyous Sound" from Period of Transition is a song called "Mechanical Bliss" which is weird, kind of strange...

VM: That was a big disappointment for me because I was trying to break into comedy there and that was my only comedy song. I played it for Dudley Moore and he flipped over it; he really loved it. I thought, "This is it. This is my big chance." But Warner Bros. buried it.

PV: It was a flipside and wasn't on any album, but it does show a humorous side of you. A lot of people look at you as being the brooding musician who rarely cracks a smile. Are you aware of people having that image of you as the depressed poet?

VM: Yeah, but I think it's totally wrong. Things have been written and people get hold of certain things and put it in the paper and it gets blown out of proportion. Like the thing that I don't do many interviews. That's wrong. I've done so many interviews you wouldn't believe it. Writers have something about everybody: "Oh he's like that," which usually he isn't.

PV: Do you think, though, that people might get that idea, too, from your live shows? You're very much into your music and the music is the bottom line in your live shows. But do you think people expect you to be more of a--

VM: If I went out there and tried comedy, what would happen? It would be "What?" When I've done that, they don't know what to make of it because the image that's out there is not conducive for me to do comedy. I've been in bands where I've done actual comedy.

PV: At a recent show at the Palace of Fine Arts [in SF] a couple of people yelled out, "Van, talk to us. Say something to us." You hear that when they say it, don't you?

VM: Yeah, but you can't please everybody. When I'm playing I've got to concentrate on the music--the arrangements and the people and getting the moment. If I start developing myself as a personality, that's another form of concentration, so in order to concentrate on that I couldn't do what I do now. I would have to change completely. I have to concentrate to build the energy and I have to put a spell on it, so to speak, to do it. I don't want to talk because it would break the spell. Music is what I'm saying.

PV: Is it frustrating to think that a lot of people don't pick up on that and think that you're just being cold?

VM: Who are "they"? Different people think different things and the audience is made up of individuals. Some people like it and some people don't. I do what I do and if people get it, great. And if they don't get it, they don't have to buy it.

PV: In the past year or so, when you have performed the song "Angeliou", you've expressed some opinions in the break there, little ad libs or whatever. One time I wrote down what you said: "This is the part--this is my message--it only takes a few--everyone will get it sooner or later." What will they get?

VM: The message is not in actual lyrics, because lyrics are different every time. And the message is not really in songs. The message is behind the whole thing, which is getting very, very quiet. And when you get very, very quiet you can actually hear yourself. That's what I was trying to say. I was trying to show the dynamics in the music. There's not enough education about what music is today. Kids aren't taught what it is, and I was trying to do a little teaching about it: these elements are in music because they exist in ourselves and society. Anger is in rock and roll, love is in there. There's a lot of different energy. But if you go out and you don't know what you're doing with it--you're just *blasting* this energy--then it becomes destructive. I was trying to show people, "this is energy and *this* is energy, but ultimately the real energy that we're dealing with is the energy that's inside you that you can only hear when you get quiet. And the whole purpose of that was to make people listen to themselves.

PV: At another point in that break in "Angeliou" you referred to a San Francisco music critic who put your music in with rock and roll and you said, "It's not rock and roll, that's not what it's all about." Is rock and roll a bad image in your mind?

VM: Oh yeah. Once you say "rock and roll" people start to project and relate to you in a certain way. I'm just so far away from that projection and that image. The way I live my life from day to day is so far removed from what people think of when you say "rock and roll." I've got nothing to do with all that rock and roll stuff at all. When I started out, when I was a teenager, rock and roll to me was Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and Chuck Berry and people like that. But now, what is rock and roll? Rock and roll is a mind trip. It's not music anymore.

PV: Are you aware of what albums are selling these days; what's at the top of the charts? Do you keep abreast at all of any of that?

VM: I don't really know. Some of the new music is interesting. I definitely believe we need a new music, something new in order to survive. If music is such a big thing in everybody's life--and I think it is--we need something different because the garbage that we keep getting is going to make everybody sick after a while. I think the young kids are crying out--screaming--for something new. That's why you're getting all this really destructive punk music. They're saying, "We can't take it anymore. We'll do anything." I feel like some of it is very adventurous, and I like that about it. But some of it has turned into a very destructive thing.

PV: How far in advance do you work as far as writing goes? Do you have songs that you've written and that you'll get back to or do you try to stay pretty current with what you're doing?

VM: I try to stay current, but like I said before, I'm an inspirational writer so I've always got bits and pieces hanging around. I never really put it together unless I've got a contract. If I didn't have a contract to do an album, I wouldn't do it.

PV: Until the mood hit you.

VM: I'd only do it if I need the money, if I needed to do it for survival purposes. Otherwise I'd never do it. I went through that phase years ago of being successful, and then I went through the phase of being a successful songwriter. I went through those phases and saw what they were. When you see what something is, then you can drop it; if you don't see what it is, then you keep doing it.

PV: Your music is always changing. Are those mainly conscious or unconscious changes?

VM: At this point it's conscious, because I'm actually starting to work on it. It's taken me 20 years to be able to see what it is I'm involved in and what I'm actually doing with it. You find out after a while it's just too limiting to make an album and tour, make another album and tour. It's not very creative. So you start exploring: what does a C chord mean? It could mean a lot of different things; it could be a color. The C chord means a certain thing, the G chord means certain things. What does this song mean? What do these lyrics mean? It took me 20 years to get to this point, where I'm consciously involved with what I'm doing.

2011-05-04T03:17:00.003+01:00

Glen Hansard On Meeting Van Morrison

2011-04-28T00:06:00.000+01:00

New Poll: What's Your Favorite Van Morrison Album of the 1980s?

Vote in the column on the left

Common One (1980)

Beautiful Vision (1982)

Inarticulate Speech of the Heart (1983)

Live At The Belfast Grand Opera House (1984)

Sense of Wonder (1985)

No Guru, No Method, No Teacher (1986)

Poetic Champions Compose (1987)

Irish Heartbeat (1988)

Avalon Sunset (1989)

2011-04-18T03:48:00.001+01:00

Van Photo Of The Day


Van Morrison Boston 1970

Photo by AJ Sullivan

2011-04-01T01:05:00.012+01:00

And Your Stairway Reaches Up To The Moon

Guardian More than any other writer, Van Morrison seems blessed with a transformational power to bring a beautiful vision to even the most humdrum objects and events

In my mind, the Vanlose Stairway of Van Morrison's song was always a majestic affair; not quite the full Scarlett O'Hara, but certainly something with a little grandeur. I'm not sure when I learned that it was, in reality, not much more than a flight of stairs running to the fourth floor of a plain apartment block in Copenhagen, but when I looked up the picture again this week, I was struck by the building's ordinariness: pale brick, small balcony, broad, blank windows.

In the early 1980s, Morrison stayed at an apartment here with a girlfriend named Ulla Munch. She inspired much of the material from his 1982 album Beautiful Vision, including Vanlose Stairway. Morrison referred to this song as "a Twenty Flight Rock" – a nod to Eddie Cochran's fabulously euphemistic 1957 hit about climbing 20 flights to see his "baby", only to find on his arrival that he is too tired to "rock".

Van's stairway song is a little more spiritual – sewn with references to Krishna, the Bhagavad Gita and the Bible. And it's a little more romantic, too: "And your stairway/ Reaches up to the moon," he growls, "And it comes right back/ It comes right back to you." Here, alongside the moonlit wooing and the spirituality, there is even room for a few references to John Lee Hooker's Send Me Your Pillow and Little Richard's Send Me Some Lovin', too.

It is one of my favourite Morrison songs, a perfect ball of love and desire, belief and rock'n'roll, and, perhaps more oddly, one of the most frequently performed songs at his shows. Peter Mills, in Hymns to the Silence, refers to it as "this dark horse of a song" – a way to describe the surprising appeal of a song that was never a hit, but has proved compelling to many.

Beautiful Vision is not one of Morrison's most critically feted albums. In his recent book Listening to Van Morrison, Greil Marcus numbered it among the 15 Van albums he would happily write off, consigning it to "the endless stream of dull and tired albums through the 1980s and 90s, carrying titles like warning labels … a string of records where Morrison seems to attempt to reduce whatever might be elusive, undefinable, and sui generis in his music to parts that can never recombine into a whole."

There are Morrison albums I like better, but Beautiful Vision has never struck me as dull; on the contrary, its particular strangeness has always proved appealing – an exploration of Celtic heritage, distance, reminiscence, spirituality and the writings of Alice Bailey. Its most commercial track is Cleaning Windows, a wistful tale of a stint as a window cleaner, that marries the pleasures of physical work and sensory delights – bakery smells, Paris buns, and smoking Woodbines – to a time of expanding artistic and intellectual vision, of playing sax on the weekend, listening to Jimmie Rodgers on a lunch break, reading Kerouac and Christmas Humphreys, hearing Leadbelly and Blind Lemon on the street.

Cleaning Windows, like the rest of Beautiful Vision, seems to me an attempt to explain how a spiritual, emotional life does not exist in isolation, how the lemonade and Paris buns are as stirring as the Kerouac, and how the memory of both can be tethered to those "wrought iron gate rows". This has always been what I loved about Morrison: more than any other songwriter, he seems blessed with a transformational power, with the ability to bring a beautiful vision to even the most humdrum objects and events – the "clicking, clacking of the high-heeled shoe", the "crack in the windowpane", the "decent sherry" and the "drop of port", and "this letter-box behind this door here …"

And perhaps this spurs Vanlose Stairway, that dark horse of a song, perhaps it is simply the strange and beautiful majesty of finding the Gita, and the Cochran, and the moonlight, in the pale brick, small balcony, and broad, blank windows of an ordinary apartment block in Copenhagen.

-Laura Barton

2011-03-04T15:36:00.000Z

Here's a Short Video About What Makes Van's Music Special To So Many People

2011-02-27T01:55:00.002Z

Reader's Questions

I get a good few questions here at the blog. Many are the same questions from many people so I have compiled a list of the most frequent asked questions and I try to answer best as I can. If any readers out there can answer - please use comments section below. Thanks.

-John

Q: Do you know what happened to the rest of the great Van Morrison remaster series?
It seems like the rest of the announced stuff (CDs) will not be released in the near future.
Maybe you know something about it.

Thanks also for your great site & best wishes.

-Frank L. (Germany)

A: It seems when Van left his last record label, the re-issues were discontinued. It doesn't appear that Van is currently with any record label as of today so it may be awhile before we see them.

Q: Do you have contact details for Van's booking agency?

-Peter R. (Durban, South Africa)

A: No - I have no contact with Van's management or booking agency nor do i know how to get in contact with them.

Q: As an avid Van Morrison fan, I was wondering whether there is any new music in the offing currently, whether there is a new Van Morrison CD being made, organized, or even planned.

Wondering if you have any insights?

-Gavin T. (Australia)

A: I have not heard anything about a new album release from Van. I also do not know if he's recording or not.

Q: Where can I find a list of Van's future concerts?

-CJ

A: When I hear of concert dates and can confirm them - I post them on this blog as soon as possible. Only other suggestion is to sign up for email alerts from Ticketmaster for Van gigs.

Q: I live in Wellington New Zealand and I’ve been a fan of Van Morrison’s music since the days of “Them”

It would be great to know if Van has ever toured in New Zealand?

The DVD version of Astral Weeks live has never been available in New Zealand (we’re zoned 4) and I wonder why this DVD has never been released here in New Zealand.

What has been available in New Zealand to purchase I have (cd’s, video and vinyl).

Cheers,

-Russell F (Wellington, New Zealand)

A: To the best of my knowledge, I do not think Van has ever toured New Zealand. If any readers know - please comment.

The Astral Weeks Live At The Hollywood Bowl DVD has been discontinued and is not available for sale anymore. I'm not sure what is available in New Zealand in terms of CDs and DVDs. Does any reader from there know?

Q: I am looking for a site or database which would have the setlist for the Feb. 20, 1979 concert in Belfast?

I've searched and searched with no luck. Can you offer any help?

-Stuart S.

A: Try setlist.com

Q: Is there a version of Coney island (live ?) where Van goes straight in to have i told you lately that i love you.

I heard from a friend they played it on an Irish radio station a while back. If so what cd does it come from?

-Derek T. (Ireland)

A: Never heard of such a recording. I do not think it exists.

Q: Wonder if you can help me locate a song Van recorded some years back which featured a trombone backing 'chorus'. I'd be very happy if you could point me to it.

-Malc S.

A: Not sure which song you heard. Does anyone know?

2011-02-18T15:36:00.003Z

This Blog Started 5 Years Ago Today!

Thanks To All The Followers For Their Great Support!

2011-01-18T21:12:00.000Z

Connect With Other Van Morrison Fans Around The World

The Van Fan Mailing List

The Van Fan Yahoo Group

The Van Morrison News Blog Facebook Page

The Van Morrison News Blog Twitter Page

2011-01-15T17:52:00.007Z

Unreleased Van Tracks On Forthcoming Chris Barber 2 CD Set

Update: Chris Barber has a 2 CD compilation coming out in the UK on 5 September, the US and Canada on 8 February and Germany on 6 May 2011. Release dates subject to change..

Memories of My Trip include three tracks that Van recorded with Barber that have never been released before:

Van With The Chris Barber Skiffle Group - How Long Blues

Van With Chris Barber's Jazz Band - Goin' Home

Van With Chris Barber And Dr. John - Didn't He Ramble

So far there's no information on when these tracks were recorded. Van has played and toured with Chris Barber many times over the years.

2011-01-10T10:37:00.004Z

Take Me Back
Bono Interviews Dylan & Van (1984)

From Hot Press:

Conducted at the Slane Castle, Dublin, Ireland prior to Dylan's show (JULY 8, 1984). Both Bono and Van Morrison were later guests at the show, Van Morrison doing his usual It's All Over Now, Baby Blue and Bono joining Dylan on Blowin' In The Wind.

Bono: Van, what do you think of electronic music?

Morrison: I like the music Brian Eno plays.

Bono: He speaks very highly of you. He's producing our record right now.

Morrison: Say hello.

Bono: When you're working with a producer, do you give him the lee-way to challenge you?

Dylan: Yeah, if he feels like it. But usually we just go into the studio and sing a song, and play the music, and have, you know ...

Bono: Have you had somebody in the last five years who said "That's crap, Bob"?

Dylan: Oh, they say that all the time!

Bono: Mark Knopfler, did he say that?

Dylan: I don't know, they spend time getting their various songs right, but with me, I just take a song into the studio and try to rehearse it, and then record it, and then do it. It's a little harder now though to make a good record - even if you've got a good song and a good band. Even if you go in and record it live, it's not gonna sound like it used to sound, because the studios now are so modern, and overly developed, that you can take anything good and you can press it and squeeze it and squash it, and constipate it and suffocate it. You do a great performance in the studio and you listen back to it because the speakers are all so good, but, ah, no!

Bono: All technology does is - you go into a dead room with dead instruments and you use technology to give it life that it doesn't have, and then it comes out of the speakers and you believe it. What I've been trying to do is find a room that has life in itself.

Dylan: Yeah.

Bono: A 'living' room.

Dylan: The machines though, can even take the life out of that room, I've found. You can record in St Peter's Cathedral, you know, and they still make it sound like, eh, ...

Bono: Somebody's backyard.

Dylan: Yeah.

Dylan: That's a good idea. I'd love to record in a cathedral.

Dylan: You know the studios in the old days were all much better, and the equipment so much better, there's no question about it in my mind. You just walked into a studio, they were just big rooms, you just sang, you know, you just made records; and they sounded like the way they sounded there. That stopped happening in the late Sixties, for me anyway. I noticed the big change. You go into a studio now and they got rugs on the floor, settees and pinball machines and videos and sandwiches coming every ten minutes. It's a big expensive party and you're lucky if you come out with anything that sounds decent.

Bono: Yeah, records haven't got better, have they?

Dylan: No, you go in now, you got your producer, you got your engineer, you got your assistant engineer, usually your assistant producer, you got a guy carrying the tapes around. I mean, you know, there's a million people go into recording just an acoustic song on your guitar. The boys turn the machines on and it's a great undertaking.

Bono: There's a system called Effanel which Mick Fleetwood from Fleetwood Mac brought to Africa. It was built for him because he wanted to get some real African drummin', for "Tusk". We've used that system. It comes in a light suitcase, very small, no bullshit studio, and it just arrives, you can literally bring it to your living room.

Morrison: I think all the same they'll go back to 2-track eventually.

Bono: There's a guy called Conny Plank, who lives in Germany. He's a producer I think. He produced Makem and Clancy and some Irish traditional bands, also orchestral and funnily enough a lot of the new electronic groups, DAF, Ultravox, and so on. He used to record orchestras by just finding a position in the room where they were already balanced and he applies this in his thinking, in recording modern music: he finds a place in the room where it's already mixed.

Morrison: I don't know, when I started we didn't think about that! You didn't even think about recording ... (laughs)

Bono: You didn't even think!

Morrison: You didn't even know what was on the cards. One day you were in the room, they turned the tape on. After about eight hours or so, they'd say, 'OK, tea break, it's over'.

Dylan: Yeah, next song, next song!

Morrison: And that was that - it was an album.

Dylan: Yeah, you'd make an album on three days or four days and it was over - if that many! It's that long now ... it takes four days to get a drum sound.

Bono: Do you know the Monty Python team, they're comedians, British comedians, 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail'. They have a sketch that reminds me of you guys - sitting back talking of days gone by: "You tell that to the young people of today and they'd never believe you". But you can't go backwards, you must go forward. You try to bring the values that were back there, you know, the strength, and if you see something that was lost, you got to find a new way to capture that same strength. Have you any idea of how to do that? I think you've done it by the way ... I think 'Shot Of Love', that opening track has that.

Dylan: I think so too, You're one of the few people to say that to me about that record, to mention that record to me.

Bono: That has *that* feeling.

Dylan: It's a great record, it suits just about everybody.

Bono: The sound from that record makes me feel like I'm in the same room as the other musicians. I don't feel like they're over *there*. Some of our records, I feel like they're over there because we got into this cinema type sound, not bland like FM sound, but we got into this very broad sound. Now we're trying to focus more of a punch, and that's what we are after, this intimacy .... I've never interviewed anybody before, by the way. I hate being interviewed myself.

Morrison: You're doing a good job!

Bono: Is this OK?. Good! What records do you listen to?

Dylan: What records do I listen to? New records? I don't know, just the old records really. Robert Johnson. I still listen to those records that I listened to when I was growing up - they really changed my life. They still change my life. They still hold up, you know. The Louvain Brothers, Hank Williams, Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Charlie Patton, I always liked to listen to him.

Bono: I just bought Woody Guthrie's 'Bound For Glory'. I'm just a beginner when it comes to America. I mean, it's changed me. When you go the US, coming from this country, it's more than a different continent ....

Morrison: It's shell shock.

Bono: Yeah, coming from troubled Ireland, it's the real shell shock! I'm just getting acquainted with American music and literature. Do you still see Allen Ginsberg?

Dylan: I run across Allen from time to time, yeah, Gregory Corsos's back now, he's doing some readings, I think he's just published a new book.

Bono: I've just been reading this book 'Howl'.

Dylan: Oh, that's very powerful. That's another book that changed me. 'Howl', 'On the Road', 'Dharma Bums'.

Morrison: (to Bono) Have you read 'On the Road'?

Bono: Yes I have, I'm just starting that. You have a reference in one of your songs to John Donne, 'Rave On John Donne'. Have you read his poetry?

Morrison: I was reading it at the time.

Dylan: (to Bono) You heard the songs - Brendan Behan's songs?

Bono: Yeah.

Dylan: 'Royal Canal', you know the 'Royal Canal'?

Morrison: His brother wrote it. His name is Dominic.

Dylan: Oh, Dominic wrote 'Royal Canal'?

Bono: You know Brendan's son hang out around here in Dublin. He's a good guy, I believe.

Dylan: I know the solo lyrics to the 'Royal Canal'. I used to sing it all the time.

Bono: How does it go?

Dylan: (sings) 'The hungry feeling came over me stealing, as the mice were squalling in my prison cell'.

Bono: That's right, yeah!

Dylan: (continues) 'That old triangle went jingle jangle, all along the banks of the Royal Canal'.

Bono: That's right, when did you read that?

Dylan: (there's no way stopping him now) 'In the female prison there's seventy women. It's all over there that I want to dwell. And that old triangle goes jingle jangle, all along the banks of the Royal Canal'.

Bono: Have you been to the Royal Canal?

Dylan: No I used to sing that song though. Every night.

Bono: Our music - as I was saying earlier - it doesn't have those roots.

Morrison: Yeah, there was a break in the lineage. I sussed that out when I went to see Thin Lizzy years ago, the first night in L.A. and I was watching at the back of the stage and I realized that the music was a complete cut in the connection between the end of the Sixties and the middle of the Seventies - a severing of the traditional lineage of groups.

Bono: I like to know more about roots music. I'm hungry for a past.

Morrison: You know you should listen to some of that stuff.

Bono: I will. I've been listening to some gospel music, you know, like the Swan Silvertones, and stuff like that.

Dylan: That's US stuff though.

Morrison: US stuff, but the British stuff you should listen to, you know, like some of the old stuff, like the Yardbirds.

Bono: Yeah, I've got some of their tapes recently, some real good tapes.

Dylan: You can still hear the McPeakes. The next generation may not be able to though. Who knows? I would hate to think that. Listen we're gonna have to get ready to play. Are you gonna stay for the show?

Bono: Certainly, that's what I'm here for actually.

Dylan: To record it, HA!

2011-01-07T20:12:00.009Z

Vote For A Great Jazz Song
Moondance

NPR's A Blog Supreme is asking it's listener's to vote for The greatest Jazz songs Ever.

Soon, our Seattle-based NPR Music partners Jazz24 will create an online stream called The Jazz 100, featuring the 100 quintessential recorded jazz songs of all time. But first, Jazz24 needs to figure out what those songs are.

So they're asking for help. You can nominate your favorites for consideration at the Jazz24 website. Soon, they'll sit down and make the list using your input. And then you'll be able to hear the songs in a 24/7 streaming mix (think the All Songs Considered channel) here at NPR Music for two weeks.

Van's Moondance is a song that many fans believe is a jazz standard. Do you think so? If so, please vote at Name The 100 Greatest Jazz Songs Ever.

2011-01-02T20:54:00.003Z

Tom Jones, Jeff Beck & Van
Bring It On Home To Me
Trouble In Mind

From Martin Scorsese's 2003 Blues Documentaty.

2010-11-15T00:10:00.003Z

40th Anniversary of Van's His Band And The Street Choir Album

Van Morison's His Band And The Street Choir was released 40 years ago today on 15 November 1970. Originally titled Virgo's Fool, Street Choir was renamed by Warner Brothers without Van's consent. Van had intended to record the album a cappella with only vocal backing by a vocal group he called the Street Choir.

Side one

"Domino"

"Crazy Face"

"Give Me a Kiss (Just One Sweet Kiss)"

"I've Been Working"

"Call Me Up in Dreamland"

"I'll Be Your Lover, Too"

Side two

"Blue Money"

"Virgo Clowns"

"Gypsy Queen"

"Sweet Jannie"

"If I Ever Needed Someone"

"Street Choir"

Street Choir peaked at number 32 on the Billboard 200 and number 18 on the UK Album Chart and was help mainly by the Top Ten hit Domino. Some songs on the album were previously recorded a few years earlier: I've Been Working was an out-take from the Astral Weeks sessions in 1968 and the Moondance sessions in 1969; If I Ever Needed Someone was also originally recorded in 1968; Virgo Clowns was first recorded at the start of 1969 as (Sit Down) Funny Face; Crazy Face evolved from "Going Around with Jesse James", a song Van first recorded for Astral Weeks on 15 October 1968.

Rolling Stone magazine's, Jon Landau, reviewed Street Choir and described it as follows:

His Band and the Street Choir is a free album. It was recorded with minimal over-dubbing and was obviously intended to show the other side of Moondance. And if it has a flaw it is that, like Moondance, it is too much what it set out to be. A few more numbers with a gravity of "Street Choir" would have made this album as close to perfect as anyone could have stood.

But notwithstanding its limitations. His Band and the Street Choir is another beautiful phase in the continuing development of one of the few originals left in rock. In his own mysterious way. Van Morrison continues to shake his head, strum his guitar and to sing his songs. He knows it's too late to stop now and he quit trying to a long, long time ago. Meanwhile, the song he is singing keeps getting better and better.

2010-11-09T04:33:00.010Z

RTE Radio 1: Listening to Van Morrison

A special programme, Listening To Van Morrison, with Greil Marcus, American music and cultural critic, author of Listening to Van Morrison (Faber), as he explains what he has come to understand about Morrison's music from paying it deep attention, with special emphasis on the achievement and enduring appeal of Astral Weeks (1968).

2010-10-25T04:45:00.035+01:00

24-Oct-10 Royal Albert Hall, London, England

Van reached some incredible heights at the RAH last night. The range in his voice once he opened up with Fair Play, after the toe-tapping ‘greatest hits’ openers, was simply stunning. We saw Van the jazz musician, the blues-man and the pop singer but it is those searching, searing moments of stunning ‘Celtic soul’ that make Van so unique and that bring shivers to the spine and tears to the eyes. And there were plenty of them last night, with Fair Play, In the Garden, Into the Mystic, and Ballerina simply stunning and all worth the ticket price alone. Beautiful, beguiling, rousing, compelling, life-affirming music that just touches something, who knows what…. So, a fantastic show and thank goodness that Van is still performing, still playing and singing these songs. But when a Van show ends though you’re always left wanting just that little bit more which is, I guess, a good thing….Thank you Van.

-Simon

At 45 minutes last night after a sublime In The Garden I thought "This could be the best show ever". He then took us higher still, but it trailed off a bit, and the crowd-pleasing Have I Told You Lately and Bright Side were extremely flat, with a rousing Help Me and Gloria bringing it back up.

Thanks to Paolo for photos.

Fair Play was wonderful, Little Village merely great and Moondance - as ever - let the band stretch out. Although I groaned when it started, Keep Mediocrity At Bay was enjoyable, as was Keep It Simple later - just goes to show that Van does things with songs on stage that don't happen in the studio.

The first hour, after the now traditional throat warmers (Baby Please Don't Go>Here Comes The Night>BEG) was stunning - it summed up the reason why we all do this. All In The Game, In The Garden, a great Celtic Excavation>Into The Mystic and the rendition of Ballerina was the best I've heard - a completely different song - but then..............

But I still came out smiling. I bumped into Simon at the merchandise stand - he thought it a '7', I'd have said '8' - just for Fair Play, Garden and Ballerina. What's great is that Van is performing these songs now as well as - or better - than ever and his voice is still way beyond what anybody else can do. It could have been sublime, but he was merely wonderful. Are we setting our expectations high again, and isn't that great?

The band were on the whole excellent, although the drummer needs a bit of education - I heard him too much. Good to see Paul Moore back on bass. Nobody can ever replace David Hayes, but I thought Paul was good in the shows before the Astral Weeks tour. Jay Berliner continues to be perfect, and Paul Moran holds it all together. The lead guitarist (Andy Jones?) was impressive on his solos without being over-indulgent. The two young horn players, one on trombone, the other on tenor sax, flute, clarinet and oboe, were excellent. As JC said afterwards, it's great that Van uses young players in his band. They played with real confidence. At one point, we had trumpet, trombone and two saxes wailing out - when did that last happen? (I know - Glasgow the night before).

As ever, it was equally wonderful meeting a load of old friends, and even more new ones. I'll forget people, for which usual apologies, but there were fans from Belgium, Holland, France, Spain and probably loads of other places. Great to see Pat again after too many years, the wonderful, Dail, Peter, JC, Brenda, Julia, Marion, Bert, Brendan - the list isn't endless but it may as well be with my memory! Nosey took pains to make introductions - a real Vanbassador.

Just before we left the pub for the show, Nosey and I were talking to a young couple. It was their first van show. He'd always loved his music, her dad had always been a fan and brought her up on it. I hope they enjoyed what we all got.

Cheers

-Jez

This was Van 2010 version. Greatest hits live it was billed as and taking away Keep Mediocrity At Bay that is what we got.

For those of us fortunate enough to have witnessed the sensational Astral Weeks shows at The RAH this show was always going to be difficult one.

Van however was at his professional best. Most importantly he gave 100% to all the songs. The newish band were excellent however Van without Richie Buckley is always a sadness.

The new start with the medley of Baby please don't go, Brown Eyed Girl and Here Comes The Night was fine. Fair Play was wonderful. The £200 price tag was actually made good value by a 15 minute period during which he took us all into that higher ground in a way that only he can.

In the Garden was remarkable - always a strong closing song at his live gigs in the late 80's - his sensitive delivery was just stunning. Definite highlight of the night.

However many times I have seen him play Game live it never disappoints and this version was one of the best.

I have a feeling that we may only see Van on odd occasions in the UK in years to come. I hope that we don't just get greatest hits shows. I will keep going even if it is for those magical few minutes which still enthrall and amaze us.

Also while he still cares it is worth going. There was a sense of real effort last night. Thanks Van - come back again.

-Johnny Longley

Sunshine In London

I knew it was going to be a great Sunday. I woke to see three swans gliding on the glass water of our dock, in the weak autumn sun of a chilly blue sky. It was a majestic start to a day that ended with a Van Morrison concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

If you have read any of my blog posts, you will know I am crazy about Van Morrison’s music. Like silly crazy. So when my husband got this new job, we celebrated by buying tickets for this one-night-only Classic Van concert at the Royal Albert Hall. He knew it was a big treat for me, as I had eyed this show since it was first announced back in June. I think we got the last two tickets in the house. We didn’t even sit together. And our seats were in the “choir” section, above and behind the stage. We had a fabulous view of the band, and – knowing Van and his propensity to turn to face his band – I was pretty confident we’d see more of his face that way. And we did.

We had to brave the cold London evening and cross the city on unreliable weekend public transport, but we arrived a good hour early. The Royal Albert Hall is a beautiful, regal venue in South Kensington, built as part of Prince Albert’s vision for the promotion of the arts and science. It was completed after Prince Albert’s death from typhoid, and opened in 1871. Directly opposite it, in Hyde Park, is the famous golden memorial to the Prince Consort, described as one of the grandest, high-Victorian gothic extravaganzas anywhere. At night it stands in grand, spot-lit splendour against a dark sky.

We went into the Hall as soon as the doors opened, bought some coffee and hung around the foyer and the corridors. We looked at brochures and framed photographs of stars on the hall’s hallowed stages, reckoning we’d take our seats about 15 minutes before the show was due to start. I was so excited I couldn’t stand still … classic Van, man! Does it get better than that? Seriously? I don’t think so.

Our seats were not too bad, one row and about five seats apart. Enough for me to keep looking at my husband and smiling and waving and winking and smiling and waving and, did I say smiling? There was not much leg room between the rows, and I was glad not to be long-legged, nor to have shoes one size bigger. The seat was big enough for me to boogy in, though, and boogy I did!

I sat next to a stiff-lipped English couple, and a cheerful Dutch chappy in a checked shirt. Turns out he was as much of a Van fan as I am – sheesh, he’d flown in from the Netherlands for the concert – and we soon became new best friends.

The band started to arrive on the stage, the lights went down and that big voice said, “Ladies and gentleman, MR VAN MORRISON!” I like that voice. And that’s when I began to scream. And whistle.

Van, in trademark dark suit, dark glasses and black fedora, walked on to the stage, microphone in hand, harmonica in mouth, and opened his show with a medley of Baby, Please Don’t Go and Here Comes the Night. I felt like crying. He went on to sing his well-known favourites like Brown Eyed Girl, Moondance, Have I told You Lately, Into the Mystic, Ballerina, Bright Side of the Road. My personal favourite was All in the Game, which he teased out into the most incredible arrangement with solos from each of his band members: trombonist, pianist, saxophonist, drummer, double bass player, lead guitarist and acoustic guitarist. The double bass player doubled as a bass guitarist, and Van doubled as a saxophonist and harmonica player. I can’t even describe the music they made – just sublime.

I loved watching Van control his musicians with the flick of his hand and a trilling of his fingers. He did what he does so well – brings the music to a stomping crescendo and then right back down to a whisper. I was with him on his every word, every note and I didn’t want to miss a thing. He closed with a rousing version of Gloria, which brought the entire audience to its feet. It was indescribable to experience a packed Royal Albert Hall, filled to the rafters, with Van-loving punters clapping and screaming and whistling for his music never to end. We couldn’t take photographs, but that sight – and feeling – overwhelmed me as it etched itself in my mind.

I made a note of Van’s playlist, lest I forget, and my Dutch neighbour chipped in when he thought I might not know the title – which, believe me, wasn’t often! If I couldn’t sit with my husband, it was wonderful to sit beside another fellow Van fan. After the show finished, we agreed we had just experienced a very very special concert. I told him I had felt like crying, and he said, “Yes, I had some of those moments too.”

One thing about Van’s music is that it is so difficult to categorise. When I look for his music in a music shop, I never know whether to look in the soul section, R & B, jazz, blues, folk. His music could be in any or all of those. But last night, I was reminded that he is in a category all of his own: awesome. Totally awesome.

Setlist
Baby Please Don’t Go->Here Comes The Night
Brown Eyed Girl
Fair Play/Autumn Song
Keep Mediocrity at Bay
Little Village
Moondance
It's All in the Game
In The Garden
Celtic Excavation->Into The Mystic
Ballerina
Have I Told You Lately
Bright Side Of The Road
Keep It Simple
Help Me
Gloria

Big Hand for the Band!
Chris White - Sax
Alistair White - Trombone
Jeff Lardner - Drums
Paul Moore - Bass
Paul Moran - Organ
Jay Berliner - Guitar

Much thanks to Paolo for his amazing photos - see them here. Grazie!

2010-10-24T16:14:00.012+01:00

23-Oct-10 Glasgow Clyde Auditorium, Glasgow, Scotland

Van's performance was very impressive. He was in the centre of a group of exceptional musicians who played quietly for the most part. The effect was entrancing as Van sang beautifully and effortlessly controlled the proceedings.

Band: No band introductions, but no Richie Buckley, no David Hayes
Two short points of note:

In The Garden was performed with the stage bathed in violet light for the duration of the song. This evoked thoughts of his "father and his mother' as well as the No Guru album sleeve. After singing the "father and the son and the holy ghost" once, he changed it to "holy guardian angel" which he repeated many times towards the end of the song.

Secondly, in over thirty years of attendance at Van's Scottish shows this was the first I have experienced with any empty seats. In fact entire rows in the more expensive sections remained unused. It was clearly a reaction to the ticket prices which were double what had been charged for his last visit.

Regards (and thanks for all your great work)

-Stephen McGinn

Thank you, Stephen. Stephen is a long time Van fan and created of the Van Morrison Newsletter over 20 years ago.

Setlist

Baby Please Don't Go/Here Comes The Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Little Village

Playhouse

Keep It Simple

Rough God Goes Riding

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

It's All In The Game/You Know What They're Writing About

Moondance/My Funny Valentine

St James Infirmary

Celtic Excavation/Into The Mystic

In The Garden

Ballerina

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for the Band!
Chris White - Sax
Alistair White - Trombone
Jeff Lardner - Drums
Paul Moore - Bass
Paul Moran - Organ
Jay Berliner - Guitar

2010-10-10T21:11:00.000+01:00

Solomon Burke 1940-2010

2010-10-10T14:28:00.006+01:00

09-Oct-10 Santa Barbara Bowl, Santa Barbara, USA

Here's Christopher's review:

I was lucky enough to go to both these shows and they were both terrific. Van was in a good mood and in good voice both nights. The set lists were very similar. Ballerina in San Francisco but not Santa Barbara. Precious Time in Santa Barbara. Most importantly, he seemed into the music both nights so there were lots of surprises along the way. During All in the Game in San Francisco, he sang "Open up your heart," while looking straight up in the air and then said, "That's really hard......I don't want to do that." During the same song in Santa Barbara, he sort of got the giggles early on and never really recovered. He kept breaking himself up laughing. It actually seemed like a nice change.

He also tried to tell a joke both nights before Playhouse (in which jazz guitarist Jay Berliner plays an unlikely banjo). I couldn't hear the answer the first night, but it goes, "What's the difference between a banjo and a trampoline?" "You take off your shoes before you jump on a trampoline." (rim shot).

He played In the Garden wonderfully both nights but kept it very quiet for a long time in Santa Barbara. During "No Guru.....," he said something like, "That line came from a man not far from here...Ojai!" A reference to Krishnamurti, I think. Because then he said, "One more time for K" before singing another chorus of "No guru."

The Santa Barbara Bowl is a wonderful outdoor amphitheater. The sound was gorgeous but it's a hike to get in and I wondered if he would stick to his usual on-time start while lots of people were still filing in. I think he actually started almost 5 minutes early.

For awhile, I'm healed...........

- Chris

Setlist

Baby, Please Don't Go

Here Comes the Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

Little Village

Playhouse

Keep It Simple

Back on Top

Rough God Goes Riding

It's All in the Game

Precious Time

In the Garden

Celtic Excavation->Into the Mystic

Moondance->My Funny Valentine

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for The Band!

David Hayes

Paul Moran

Jay Berliner

Andy Jones

Richie Buckley

Bobby Ruggiero

Becky Ramsey

2010-10-09T16:59:00.018+01:00

08-Oct-10 Nob Hill Masonic Auditorium, San Francisco

Here's Art's Review:

Did you want some hits? Did you want to hear the blues? Philosophy? Jazz? Lengthy interior ramblings accompanied by glorious rolling grooves? or a big, powerful classic ballad? Anyway, it was all on display last night at the Nob Hill Masonic. Van was energetic, very committed to every song, even the 60's material played with conviction at the very start. And did he extend the instrumental part at the end of Brown Eyed Girl a few extra bars because 4 or 5 nubile women were up and gyrating in front of him? Probably.

From there to the first of the bucolic, meditational pieces, 1974's "Fair Play", with extemporized lyrics about church bells in the distance and beautiful solos, especially Richie Buckley on flute and Paul Moran on both piano and trumpet. Then uptempo to a shouted, rousing and defiant "Keep Mediocrity at Bay", which this time around has a harp intro and an infectious New Orleans style groove, and back down to the sublime "Little Village", highlighted by Jay Berliner ..was he playing jazz banjo on this one? Lengthy scat singing, beautiful sax from Richie Buckley.

Rough God follows, and Van finishes with his bit about ridin' on in like Jesse James, Billy the Kid, and when he gets to Clint Eastwood he turns to the band and says "He's local, right?". Then some joke about a banjo.. I think it was this one: "What's the difference between a banjo and a trampoline? You take your shoes off to jump on a trampoline. "

Playhouse, Jay on banjo and putting the band through their paces, then Keep it Simple, with some new lyrics. Now he's "down here on the killing floor" instead of "running board", referencing Willie Dixon and Howlin' Wolf, and he's gotta keep it simple "just to keep from getting screwed".

Now for the traditional centerpiece: "It's All in the Game/You Know What They're Writing About", a superb version of a song that hasn't left his repertoire since the late 70's. The new violinist, Rebecca Ramsey had a chance to shine on this one, and she added a distinctive voice, sometimes echoing movie music from the 30's, sometimes playing like a string quartet. When Van gets to the part where the abashed lover is knocking on her door to apologize, he beats repeatedly on the microphone, then comes out with "open up your heart? that's scary, I won't do that." One of many standing ovations after this was over. As Mark Watt said of the Los Angeles performance earlier this week he sang "like a man helplessly in the throes of love, heartbreak, or both.."

My personal highlight, "In The Garden", a great song that took a 7 year hiatus until it started reappearing in the shows starting last year. The band really made this performance, by turns their solos talked of eroticism (Jay), brightness and romance (Richie) and then a statement from Paul and the grand piano: "This is a Song". Majestic solos, really. Then Van seems a little perturbed, but he's getting into the deeper part of the song.. "Long notes, long notes... keep it goin'" he shouts to the band...and that triggers the return of the rolling groove, this time with the long notes that let Van counterpoint with his delirious vocal into a big orgasmic final rave-up.

Moondance follows, the still unnamed band taking turns on their instruments, finishing with Van on sax, Paul on trumpet, Richie on sax. A typically great David Hayes played a deep and interesting bass solo. Shana Morrison then came out for a crowd-pleasing duet on "Sometimes We Cry". She did a fine opening set last night, but started 45 minutes before the ticket said the show started, so she played only to the early and the tipped-off. "Back on Top", a big, bad "Georgia", then the fourth of the night's quintet of "deep" pieces, Ballerina. The new violin was a big part of the success of this one, mixing notes of string quartet, country and Hollywood. Another loud, standing ovation, and the band noodled through the fairly obscure instrumental "Celtic Excavation", reborn this year as a medley/intro for "Into The Mystic", a song which rolled and tumbled and reached more than one big crescendo, including one with repeated shouts of "rock your gypsy soul" that had the crowd where I was whipped into a frenzy.

"Help Me", Sonny Boy Willamson II's loud blues romp, started with Van on the harp and moved into great solos from the sax and Hammond organ. Van name-checks Sonny Boy and Junior Wells "in the Chicago and Detroit area", and winds it all up with a big chorus of screaming "nightshirt"'s. Big singalong for "Gloria" ends it all.

In sum, no throwaway material. Five great adventures into the music, lots of commitment from Van and the band.

Huffington Post
Singing Lessons: The Truth About What Motivates Us To Sing, Play and Hear Music

As we walked in the house that Van built on Friday night, it was like walking into a church in the midst of a ferocious revival. Van was on fire. The band was on fire. The crowd was the kind of crowd that gave its all with gratitude and love. I have heard that that sometimes shows are less inspired, but every time I have seen Morrison in concert, he has never disappointed and this night was the most thrilling.

He wore a dark suit, gray hat and black shades. We couldn't see his eyes. He cracked a few jokes, but Morrison's not gregarious. He accepts you'll come to him or you won't and doesn't seem to care what you choose. Although, you sensed he was pleased to be loved that night.

*****
What Phil (my fiance) and I heatedly discussed Saturday morning was the difference between what we saw and what we heard. Phil thought it was an amazing show, but that Van Morrison couldn't care less about the audience (we saw Chris Isaac recently -- Isaac reaches out to the audience, he cares about the audience). I contended that though Van Morrison doesn't necessarily reach out with banter or facial expression, you often can barely understand what the man is even saying, still -- his voice cries out in such a way that each person is pulled close to his soul. If you close your eyes, what you hear is sheer contact, though what you see may appear to be an introvert. "Of course, Van cares about the audience," I said, "what else would drive him to be there and to sing like that?" I don't think it's money or adulation. He is there because he cares about and feels connected to the music and the audience.

There are performers that come to us and performers that force us to go to them. Bruce Springsteen. Thelonious Monk. There are different ways of connecting.

*****
As a performer, I generally go to the audience. As a singing teacher and vocal coach, I take care not to push my students to do the same, because both kinds of performance are valid. What we connect to is subjective. Who we connect to, from their personalities to what they are saying, how they are saying it, the frequencies of their voices, all of it -- what moves us is subjective. It is about intention and perception. Performance is a two way street. What I bring to a show as a listener is as important as what the performer brings. There are three components to a song: the music, the performer and the listener.

This same concept applies to any communal endeavor. If you have to give a presentation, if you are teaching a class, if you need to inspire your kids to memorize their times tables, what makes it work is connection.

In the book Drive, Daniel Pink says "human beings have an innate inner drive to be autonomous, self-determined, and connected to one another."

What drives us to perform is connection. What drives us to attend the performance is connection. The show was so good, because we were all in contact.

*****

Sometimes it feels like magic or miracle, but we can approach it technically as artists and individuals and engender connection. The first step is creating a space. (The Masonic felt like Van's house.)

Before I go on stage, I create a space in my mind. I practice sensorial memory, so that wherever I am performing, I can make it my home.

I ask my students, before you go to sleep, lay in bed and use your imagination to create every detail of a space that belongs to you, a beach somewhere, a mountain top, your room. Know the sounds and the smells, build the details. Who is there? Who could be there, so that when you walk on stage, or in front of your classroom, or when giving an important pitch -- you will know where you are, and the room will belong to you.

How you welcome your audience into your space is a matter of individual expression. It does not have to be done with a grin, an incessant shake of your head or wide open arms. If it's your house, we'll feel it. We'll come to you and want to know what it is you are there to say.

Being connected makes us love our work. Being disconnected can make us hate vacation. Connection is what gives us meaning and makes us feel like we're somewhere.

Connection is why we are driven to sing, play and hear.

Van cares, that's why everybody is there.
-Ruth Gerson

Setlist

Baby Please Don't Go

Here Comes the Night

Browned Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

Little Village

Rough God Goes Riding

Playhouse

Keep It Simple

It's All in the Game

In the Garden

Moondance->My Funny Valentine

Sometimes We Cry

Back on Top

Georgia On My Mind

Ballerina

Celtic Excavation->Into the Mystic

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for The Band!

David Hayes

Paul Moran

Jay Berliner

Andy Jones

Richie Buckley

Bobby Ruggiero

Becky Ramsey

Thanks to Art for photo.

2010-10-07T13:23:00.005+01:00

06-Oct-10 Civic Theatre San Diego Concert Review

Here's Sean's review:
Vegas was a very good show featuring a revamped setlist and two new band members. LA Greek was perhaps a notch below although a great Game made the show feel substantial. The crowd in LA was late arriving and extremely chatty. It was also a cool and wet evening which didn't help matters. It all came together last night in San Diego. Van was on fire from the beginning. The setlist speaks for itself. It was the equal and perhaps even a slight notch above the wonderful Calgary show I saw in August. San Diego was one of those special shows. A long time Van follower, Nosey, declared it to be in his Top Ten and that it was "better than the Albert Hall." While another long time Van gig veteran, Dan Murray, noted how Van "made sounds tonight that I've never heard him make before." That ability to make his art new again, to keep us guessing, to drive the band onward and upward, to create that special kind of magic that only he can...All those gifts were on full display last night. I sat beside a woman who had never seen Van perform before. Afterwards she looked at me and said "I feel like I've been taken some place tonight that I didn't know existed." She was seriously considering a flight to SF for the Friday night show when we said our goodbyes. San Diego was the type of show that gets you hooked. Van took us on another one of those ventures into the slipstream last night. Such a rare and wondrous treat. Off to SF...
-Sean

Setlist

Baby, Please Don't Go

Here Comes the Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

Little Village

Foreign Window

Keep it Simple

End of the Land

Precious Time

Philosopher's Stone->Didn't He Ramble

That's Entrainment

Moondance->My Funny Valentine

Celtic Excavation->Into the Mystic

And It Stoned Me

Playhouse

It's All in the Game

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for The Band!

David Hayes

Paul Moran

Jay Berliner

Andy Jones

Richie Buckley

Bobby Ruggiero

Becky Ramsey

2010-10-06T13:14:00.002+01:00

05-Oct-10 Greek Theatre, Los Angeles Concert Review

Here's Mark's Review:

Tuesday night's show started in low gear despite all the old hits (e.g., "Baby Please Don't Go," "Here Comes the Night," "Brown-Eyed Girl) because the weather was cold and wet, and people kept wandering in to find their seats during the first half hour. Van found his groove with "Fair Play" (the fourth song) and concluded it with half a minute of brilliant scat singing and humming that reminded me of "Cul De Sac."

"Mediocrity at Bay" was jaunty, almost humorously angry, and more forceful in concert than on the studio album.

"Moondance" was another surprise -- lively, fresh, and intricately arranged with Van playing plenty of saxophone like he did all night. Maybe this version was so good because it was performed "beneath the cover of October skies" like the song says. It gave the band a chance to stretch out and impress. The new violinist (Becky Ramsey) and guitarist (Andy Jones) fit in comfortably with the band, and Van called on both of them to solo often. However, it's going to take awhile before their chops are in the same league as other grand Van veterans like David Hayes (on both stand-up and electric bass tonight), Jay Berliner (on banjo several times as well as guitar), and Richie Buckley (still wailing on sax like a man possessed).

Tuesday's version of "It's All in the Game" was a tour-de-force jazz singing workshop, one of the best versions I've ever heard. Van kept his shades on all evening but he came across completely vulnerable in the song tonight, like a man helplessly in the throes of love, heartbreak, or both. Van all but ascended on this version and earned a rousing ovation for it.

"Ballerina" became another vocal improvisation workshop with Van creating altered states by twisting and distending syllables into different time signatures. Then the band clicked into place and put the pedal to the metal as Van sang "Here comes the man and he says the show must go on!"

"Help Me" featured a gruff and gutteral vocal from Van, as he alternated between sax, harp, and vocals. He put lots of body English on it tonight too, swaying back and forth at the "VM" mike stand.

In short, Van seemed in high gear for about half of this show, and improvised and rearranged enough to make a lot of the old songs (e.g., "Moondance," "Fair Play," "Help Me") sound fresh again. The band impressed me more as individual virtuosos rather than as one tight cooking unit, but I'm sure they'll gel more cohesively as the month goes on. I'm tempted to attend Saturday's show in Santa Barbara so I can see how this band evolves, and whether Van brings out more nuggets from his 45-year-old songbook and finds fresh ways to interpret them.

Cheers,

-Mark

Setlist

Baby Please Don't Go

Here Comes The Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Keep Mediocrity At Bay

Keep It Simple

Bright Side of The Road

The Mystery

Playhouse

Rough God Goes Riding

Moondance

Real Real Gone

It's All in The Game

Celtic Excavation->Into the Mystic

Ballerina

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for The Band!

David Hayes

Paul Moran

Jay Berliner

Andy Jones

Richie Buckley

Bobby Ruggiero

Becky Ramsey

2010-10-04T14:12:00.004+01:00

03-Oct-10 The Joint At The Hard Rock Hotel, Las Vegas Concert Review

Here's MM's review:
Van Morrison is music itself. He is more than talented; he is gifted. He came out on the stage on time and immediately started playing. No warm-up band - just Van Morrison all night. This concert is the best concert I have ever been to. Van started with 2 songs fromThem, then went into songs from his solo years - Moondance, Brown-Eyed Girl, and Into the Mystic!! Yes, he played Into the Mystic this time!! Thank you, Van. But, he didn't sing them like they are on the albums. And, unlike any other performer, any version of a song that Van sings is as wonderful (if not better, if that is possible) as the original classic. He is truly an amazing, fascinating talent. Van had the audience in the palm of his hand all night. He was witty, charming (remember "Clint Eastwood - Howdy do, Ma'am"? Hilarious!!), and magical. I will go see Van Morrison every time he comes to town. His band was a talented group as well, from the tender, fluid notes of his violin virtuoso to the sax player, keyboard player, banjo man, and bass fiddle - what a group. They all improvised on several songs, and it was pure joy listening to all of them. Oh, and he also sang "St. James Infirmary" which was magnificent. (An old Louis Armstrong tune from the 1920s.) Van can play any genre - pop, folk, country, jazz, blues - and it stones you just like a jelly roll. And he is so very prolific and has so many classic songs, his concerts could go on much longer and he wouldn't run out of original Van material. Plus, Van was just having fun on stage. He would sing some scat and make the audience scream, whistle, and clap; and when he started listing names of American cowboy folk heros, and he tipped his hat to say "Howdy, Ma'am", he made cry from laughing so hard. Just a perfect, joyous, fun concert. Van still has his voice, his creativity (no mediocrity in Van's music, that's for sure), his sense of humor, his toughness and tenderness. One of the great artists of all time, this man. Thank you so much, Van Morrison, for sharing your music, your talent, and your wit with us.

-MysticMusic

Seltlist

Baby Please Don't Go

Here Comes The Night

Brown Eyed Girl

Fair Play

Keep Mediocrity at Bay

Moondance

Celtic Excavation

Into the Mystic

St James Infirmary

Real Real Gone

And It Stoned Me

Bright Side of the Road

Keep It Simple

Playhouse

Have I Told you Lately

Rough God Goes Riding

The Mystery

Ballerina

Help Me

Gloria

Big Hand for The Band!

David Hayes

Paul Moran

Jay Berliner

Andy Jones

Richie Buckley

Bobby Ruggiero
Becky Ramsey

2010-09-18T02:09:00.000+01:00

Dick Clark Interviews Van on American Bandstand In 1967

2010-09-12T02:24:00.007+01:00

Shana Morrison Singing on Philadelphia TV

Recent TV appearance. Shana is currently touring - find concert dates here. Includes brief interview.

2010-08-31T02:41:00.007+01:00

Van's TV Interview On The Imus In The Morning Show October 26, 2009

Van Interviewed By Don Imus Part I

Van Interviewed By Don Imus Part II