One man. One guitar. Put him on a stage and he will have the audience eating out of his hand in less than a minute. Tommy Emmanuel is a phenomenon live, and Live One catches him at his best. Packed with 28 great performances, this 2-CD set is a great ADDITION to Center Stage, which I reviewed previously. Live One is different in that it shows Tommy's evolution as well as his eclectic taste and technical mastery.
The show gets off to a rousing start with a Beatles Medley. Don't worry if you think you have heard it before - Tommy never plays it the same twice! After barely a breath he is on to a Peter Allen Medley that ends up turning into a hearty version of Waltzing Matilda. Just to keep the adrenaline pumping, we speed into a version of Classical Gas - one of Tommy's "signature tunes" that he has recorded several times, from solo to orchestral accompaniment. This time he zooms through it with breakneck runs, finally coming to relative rest with a swinging version of Old Fashioned Love Song. Then, in case you had forgotten how fast he can play, Tommy rockets through Merle Travis' Son of a Gun in a way that may make your head spin; at least it might if he didn't make it sound so easy! Wow.
Tommy's own song Dixie McGuire (misspelled on the CD jacket) begins a look into Tommy's past. This song was written for the daughter Tommy's friend, bass player Duncan McGuire, and Tommy recorded it on his first LP From Out of Nowhere. On Live One, Tommy extends the middle into a jazz improvisation that joins his older style with his newer sensibility. Then it's on to Countrywide, a theme song Tommy wrote for an Australian TV show of the same name. Again, an improvised middle keeps the song fresh. A lovely arrangement of Julian Lennon's Saltwater follows. Then we continue into Borsalino, a quirky and jaunty tune that Tommy recorded with Chet Atkins on Chet's last studio CD The Day Finger Pickers Took Over the World - one of those tunes that keeps running through your head. We head back into Tommy's past next with Up From Down Under, a beautiful ballad originally from the LP of the same name. Things get even mellower as we get closer to the present with the wonderful Morning Aire, which shows that the art of ornamenting a melody was not lost with the Baroque masters. Back to the past, we come to the moody Those Who Wait, one of Tommy's most atmospheric compositions. Continuing an uncharacteristically long stretch of slower music, Tommy plays a long-time favourite, his version of Michelle, with its incredible cascades of harmonics over the lightly swinging melody. Questions returns to the introspective mood of Those Who Wait, with a straightforward presentation of the questions at hand. Angelina breaks the spell with this touching tribute to Tommy's younger daughter, sweet with just a hint of mischief. Things get rolling again with Precious Time, that segues straight into That's the Spirit before slowing down for Mona Lisa. The first CD ends with a gently rocking version of one of Tommy's most popular songss, Mombasa.
The second CD begins with a bluesy version of Amazing Grace, and the blues mood continues into House of the Rising Sun, where Tommy highlights his blues singing as well as scatting along with his guitar improvisations (shades of George Benson!). We're on a roll as we move into Merle Travis' Guitar Rag which again features Tommy's singing voice, which seems to get better with each CD he records. Back to the fingers for another crowd favourite, Blue Moon and then to the finger-busting acrobatics of Mozzarella Tarantella. Tommy's in the groove as he continues with a great version of Guitar Boogie, followed by his own Train to Dusseldorf (definitely a bullet train!). Then it's country swing time with One Mint Julep, a jazz-inflected trip down south. For his penultimate song, Tommy reaches into his past again to pull out another crowd pleaser: The Hunt. What can possibly follow this one, with its explosions of chords, its flying runs that cover the range of the guitar, and its stop-on-a-dime changes of mood?
Initiation, Tommy's one-man tone poem that coaxes a broader range of sound out of a guitar than anyone has since Hendrix. Eerily evocative, utterly compelling, this is a composition that transcends the bounds of song. Pulsing percussion supported by inventive sound effects; moving melody above counterpoint of guitar and 'bass' as well as echoes of itself. This piece is truly an initiation into the world of Tommy Emmanuel, composer as well as guitarist and performer extraordinaire.
The only thing better than buying this CD set is to see Tommy live and then buy the CDs.
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