Ben Folds with the MSO @ HamerHall, Melbourne (22/09/06)

Thu 5th Oct, 2006 in Gig Reviews

The conductor comes out and accepts the polite applause from the crowd. The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is all tuned up and it appears to be another night at Hamer Hall. Suddenly, there’s a united roar from the dress circle which travels through the venue as a geeky forty year old, who looks like he got lost on the way to seat 34A in the dress circle, sits down at the grand piano. You can understand why some of the second violins look slightly stunned. Before they have time to react, the conductor has raised his baton and they fall into the first few bars of a new tune as this guy at the piano suddenly leaps from his seat and starts singing “Zak and Sara…”

That’s how Ben Folds and the MSO at Hamer Hall began their first Melbourne concert and it was hard to decide who was more out of their element. Ben would often stare at the orchestra mid-song grinning, amazed that he was on stage with these talented musicians while the orchestra musicians either had perplexed faces or large grins depending upon their views in regards to elbows on keyboards. That being said, the concert was a triumph in many respects and it was well worth Ben taking on such an ambitious project.

Zak and Sara was a great start to the night and immediately established interplay between piano and orchestra. With the MSO starting the song in a particularly stately manner, Ben hit the keys as the familiar tune was embellished with all manner of bells, whistles, horns. The orchestra instantly started to let itself go. Much in the same vein, One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces and Stevie’s Last Night in Town were brilliant displays of controlled musicianship from the orchestra and gutsy piano playing. The arrangements were extremely well thought out and emphasised elements of the song without overpowering them. The beginning of One Angry Dwarf, emphasised by short bursts of sound from the strings as Ben shouted “September ‘75/I was 47 inches high…” prevailed to be a perfect example.

What was surprising was that many songs I found rather weak and not some of Ben’s best material really came to life with an orchestral accompaniment. Lullabye and Gracie, a song about Ben’s baby girl, both sounded richer with a full strings section behind them. You could also hear thirty-year old women whispering to their partners “We’re having a baby tonight” as soon as Ben finished his ode to fatherhood, which was a collective “Awwww” moment.          

It was a testament to Ben Folds as an entertainer that he managed to create a sit- down night with an orchestra a barrel of laughs. With rambling stories to introduce every song, a reference to chopsticks stuck in Philosophy, then hand-claps from the crowd to reiterate his now standard practice of getting the crowd to do harmonies for Not the Same and Army; he received laughs from conductor, orchestra and crowd alike. His renditions of Landed and Brick left the crowd in silence and the opera singer who appeared for Narcolepsy was brilliant. It was ostentatious, unneeded and ridiculous but it seemed to fit the night. Ben was found as saying “Hey, I got an orchestra, why the fuck not an opera singer too?”

His encore of Army, Rockin’ the Suburbs and The Luckiest was brilliant. Once he finished, he jumped up from the grand piano, accepted the applause given by a rapturous crowd and bounded offstage with his middle fingers up to the press photographer. It’s funny to say this but it was the exit of a performer who has aged gracefully. While the Rolling Stones are still attempting to collectively castrate themselves by fitting into too-tight jeans, Ben Folds is hitting forty and playing a two hour set with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; totally respecting his angsty piano-pop roots but also being able to provide an accomplished performance which drew from all parts of his career.