Mark Splinter's show review of the legendary Swingle Singers!

Here's something a bit different for you. Legendary acapella group The Swingle Singers released their first single in 1963. They were backing singers who decided to make a name for themselves as a group in their own right, singing acapella versions of popular classics. Many years later the group is still going strong, with new members but the same original sound.

I was invited by Tobias, who sings bass and vocal percussion along with the other seven members of the group. I met him first at a very early King of the Jam event, and later at the '03 convention, and it was a nice surprise to hear he was going to be in Vilnius. I had no idea what to expect, and the idea can sound a bit cheesy, so I was interested to see what was going to happen.

Nothing could have prepared me for the reality of the Swingle Singers. Before the show, Toby explained that they would be singing the first half as a group, and the second half with an 80 piece orchestra. I couldn't wait to see orchestral music again after all these DJs and rappers, but I was still a bit scared of the cheese. Anyway, I dressed up nice with my girl and we went to the concert hall along with a few hundred other people.

Everything started quite normally, they came out and lined up in nice costumes, and started to sing. Of course everything was very gentle and polite compared to a normal beatbox show, and although I was enjoying their perfect harmonies and timing, I have to admit I smelled a little bit of cheese in the first few songs.

However, the first surprise came when they started choreographed movements around the stage, and this wasn't just stepping forward and back, this was like a strange 8 person ballroom dance which complemented the music perfectly, and enabled the audience to follow who was singing what. This for me was the most important element, bringing the music to life, rather than seeing 8 people disconnected from the sound system. The movements were simple, but always illustrating the music. The smell of cheese was not so strong any more and I started to relax.

Then came "Dido's Lament" their new single, and it was announced as an updated sound for the Swingle Singers. Toby had told me they were trying new arrangements to make a more innovative use of their format, and "Dido's Lament" was really something different. Vocal percussion was very prominent, but not overpowering. The whole piece built up slowly and carefully, relying on the beauty of the tune rather than the power of the beatbox. For me, it showed a totally new way of using beatbox with music, because we are always pushing beatbox into the front, but here it was part of a whole performance rather than an extravagant solo.

I was carefully looking around the audience to see their reaction to the idea of a human voice providing percussion... and they were clearly amazed. One woman in front of me kept shaking her head in disbelief, and the applause inbetween each song was very warm compared to the polite hand tapping I would have expected. The vocal percussion definitely added an extra edge to the choral performance, and the choreography tied everything together. The smell of cheese was totally gone.

By the time they started the James Bond theme, the choreography had warmed up even more, and they were enacting a classic Bond movie opening sequence, complete with gunpointing and sexy walking. This was now getting a bit weird, sitting in a concert hall with loads of old people in posh clothes, watching 8 singers pose with imaginary pistols while singing "dumdiddledum dum dumdumdum dum diddledum dum dumdumdum". Big shouts to the soprano, her trumpet solo actually sounded like a trumpet, just with voice, no lip buzzing or anything, it was a very very cool sound.

OK, so it was getting weird, it was totally entertaining, and I was wondering what they were going to do to Star Wars. This was when I realised we were watching a comedy show, not some kind of seriously boring opera. One of the male voices was coming to the front of the stage, to announce the next number. In a dry Jedi voice he waves his hand in front of our eyes and announces "You will enjoy this next piece of music... and then you will go to the foyer... and buy a CD". Surprisingly, everyone in the audience seems to get the joke, and the Swingle Singers lined up to start the performance while we all laughed our tits off.

Then it got, like, really really weird. Were they really marching around the stage like storm troopers? Yes. They were marching around the stage like storm troopers. This was just too cool. You would think that there were no original ways to perform a Star Wars cover version, but this was something else. Then, they started to line up in some kind of formation, boys in a line at the back, one girl in front. At the climax of the music, the boys stuck out their arms sideways, making wings either side of the girl. Then the wings opened. Yes. X-Wings. The girl in front held her microphone like a joystick, and "flew" the X-Wing left and right, dodging torpedoes or something. All the time they were singing Star Wars perfectly. It was at about this time that I started crying with laughter.

Could it get any weirder than that? Well yes. After a break and a costume change, the orchestra came out. There was some of the usual orchestra stuff, and a rendition of "Over the Rainbow" which I didn't really get into, but it was all very pleasant. Then the time came for the Sergeant Pepper Medley.

Sergeant Pepper was one of the first records my father let me listen to, so I know it quite well, and we have all heard a million bad cover versions, so I was worried about the cheese smell coming back. But one thing I forgot is that the songs on Sergeant Pepper are, well, you know, drug influenced. So I was sitting in the middle of Vilnius, listening to the State Symphony Orchestra and eight expert vocalists, belting out a song about LSD. I can tell you, it really doesn't get much weirder than that.

I want to give big thanks to Toby for inviting me to see a different side of tha beatbox, and of course to all the musicians for an amazing night. I seriously recommend that you go see them, they are touring all over the place, and you will definitely get a shock. I hear they are working with Shlomo, and their new direction is mindexpanding. Any beatboxer can learn something from the Swingle Singers, so get your nicest clothes on and go check out something different.

Check out more info on the website:
http://swinglesingers.com/

The Swingle Singers (Musical Director Tom Bullard):
Julie Kench, Joanna Goldsmith, soprano
Tom Bullard, Richard Eteson, tenor
Kineret Erez, Johanna Marshall, alto
Tobias Hug, Jeremy Sadler, bass

Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra (Art. Director and Chief Conductor Gintaras Rinkevicius) Gintaras Rinkevicius, conductor
Philip Hartley, sound engineer

Review by Mark SPLINTER