Marc’s Musings: The Spirit of Donny Is Strong in Young Hall – Nigel @ Rockwood

The show opened with an amazingly soulful cover of Greg Phillinganes’ minor ’80s R&B hit Baby, I Do Love You. And the nine song set included the Krasno-penned Leave Me Alone and Tears For Fears’ Everybody Wants To Rule The World [fast becoming a favorite of mine with this group of musicians and a regular with Chapter 2 as well]. But possibly the highlight of the night was the encore.

The band left the stage and Hall came back up with Alecia Chakour to do a duet on the Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway classic I (Who Have Nothing). It was songs like this and the set opener that one could picture this young man performing in a smoke-filled club in Detroit, Harlem, Memphis or Chicago in the ’70s. And this is why Nigel Hall has made it.

Whether rocking out and funking it up on the organ with his other bands or tickling the ivories with his “solo band,” Hall makes you think about classic ’70s Soul men like Hathaway or even Stevie. With his powerful voice, charismatic smile and quiet demeanor, this little man from Washington, DC by way of Portland is quickly becoming a giant in the Big Apple. And if you don’t move fast, you will only be seeing him on big stages that lack the intimacy of this Rockwood stand.

Gideon Luke opened. Reminiscent of D’Tripp back in the early ’90s, they are a multi-ethnic Funk band. Alecia Chakour was the act to follow Nigel and his crew. If I wasn’t running out to Brooklyn Bowl for the Funky Meters, I most definitely would have stayed to hear this young woman sing some more.

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