Jazz royalty Jacqui Dankworth headlines at Lichfield Festival
As Lichfield Festival looks forward to welcoming jazz royalty on 14 July – the singer Jacqui Dankworth – we chatted to her ahead of the date.
Jacqui follows in the footsteps of her illustrious parents, the vocalist Dame Cleo Laine and band-leader, composer and saxophonist, the late Sir John Dankworth. For many decades they were the most famous jazz couple in the UK. And they performed at Lichfield Festival in 1991.
For her own date, in Lichfield Cathedral, she’s joined by her world-class trio, and the superb Carducci Quartet.
Jacqui tells us we can expect “a stunning collaboration between different musical worlds. Exquisite sounds and really beautiful songs arranged and performed by masterful musicians. It’s an eclectic mixture of material to take you on a wonderful and emotional musical journey.”
They’re touring their recently released album Windmills which features brilliant arrangements (including several by Jacqui’s husband, and the trio’s pianist, Charlie Wood) of timeless classics by the likes of Sondheim, Legrand, Bernstein and more.
“All of the songs are from repertoire that I have known and performed over the years. Usually one finds new songs for a recording, songs that aren’t necessarily in one’s repertoire. We did it the other way round and mostly recorded songs I had been performing in concert for a while. The arrangements were already there but there had been no record of it – so we decided to change that!”
Featuring such gorgeous numbers as Send in the Clowns and The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face, if she had to pick just one from the album, Jacqui says it would be The Windmills of your Mind – the iconic song from the 1968 film The Thomas Crown Affair – with music by Michel Legrand and lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman.
“I was lucky enough to have worked with the Bergmans, and also Charlie Wood’s Spanish-influenced arrangement of this song is particularly stunning – it’s dramatic and emotional,” she says.
“But all the songs on this album have struck a chord in my life. London By Night, I have known since being a young adult, it is a gem of a song and a joy to sing…Some Other Time [by Leonard Bernstein, with lyrics by Betty Comden & Adolph Green] is a masterpiece composition and has a fresh approach here.”
It would be easy to be daunted by the prospect of singing much-loved songs, especially those performed so memorably by her mother. But Cleo had some words of advice early in Jacqui’s career: “Mum wrote to me to say I shouldn’t back off singing the Great American Songbook. All the great singers have approached this material and it is a singer’s right to do so. They are timeless songs and a good performer can put their own stamp on them. She told me not to deny myself this experience just because she had sung most of them!”
Jacqui Dankworth is at Lichfield Festival on Monday 14 July, 7.30pm, Lichfield Cathedral. Book online now or call the Festival Box Office on 01543 306271.