The Golden Age of Melody

 I only found out about this concert at lunchtime, when I met someone on the way back from shopping who said he was going.

Janice Day and Martin Litton are a fabulous duo, and I love the 1920s and 30s style songs.

Also, I don't think I'd ever seen Martin play a grand piano before - he's always been on keyboards at other concerts I've been too - and the difference was astonishing.  He's a brilliant player.  His first solo performance of the evening was The Sheikh of Araby, which was inspired by the film The Sheikh, starring Rudolf Valentino.  I've seen that film, and Valentino really did have that star quality.  Whenever he was on screen, you just couldn't take your eyes off him.  I was slightly disappointed that Janice didn't sing the lyrics to the song, though - which include the lines: "At night when you're asleep, Into your tent I'll creep"!

Some of the songs were romantic and lyrical, and some were comic.  For instance, in the same year one song writer wrote a song that was voted the most ridiculous ever, and As Time Goes By, which was later used in the film Casablanca.  Janice sang the one about playing the rumba on the tuba down in Cuba.

She also sang Three Little Fishes, which I learned when they sang it on Playschool.  It was also a song that Frankie Howerd sang, making much of the nonsense words in the chorus: "Boop boop dittem dattem wattem chu - and they swam and they swam right over the dam."

And also Mad Dogs and Englishmen. 

Other songs I knew all the words to were Sing For Your Supper and, as part of the singalong audience participation, Dream A Little Dream of Me - though I learned them from the Mamas and the Papas arrangements.

Janice also sang in French - the signature tune of Josephine Baker, a Black American who became a star in France, and was known for dancing in a skirt made of bananas (and not much else).  By contrast, Janice was looking very glamorous in a sparkly purple dress, with a subtle costume change during the interval.  

 They also had violin accompaniment from Steve Jones for a couple of the numbers.

There was, of course, rapturous applause - and their encore was Putting on the Ritz. 

 Martin will be playing as part of a quartet in the Hay Music Festival later in the year, and he and Janice are planning a concert of songs written in 1934 (which was a very good year, apparently).

Their website is www.vintagebythewye.com