Appearing at the pianist Scott Flanigan's weekly jazz club Scott's located in the nowadays fashionable Ballyhackamore district of Belfast this week is Scottish singer Louise Dodds playing with the house trio led by Flanigan who himself has been a regular for years at Belfast's groundbreaking nightly jazz spot, the hotel restaurant jazz venue Berts over in the Cathedral Quarter.
The Edinburgh-based singer's The Story Needs an Ending was released in the spring, Dodds' first album in nearly a decade. Her airy unadorned voice could lend itself to a range of other musics but heard in a jazz trio setting her own originals find a natural home. On the album the great Scottish National Jazz Orchestra drummer Alyn Cosker is at the kit.
It has been a groundbreaking 12 months for Scottish jazz with the breakthough success of the soulful Georgia Cécile the chief talking point among many. Dodds is a different kind of singer, the songs just as intimate, but more singer-songwritery and reminiscent of Irish singer Aoife Doyle a bit or even Dodds' fellow Scot, Eddi Reader.
Dodds is not an experimental singer you'd think on some songs. But consider again as layers of complexity present themself that emerge from behind a mask that traverse heartbreak, loss and what comes next. A wistful song such as 'Every Hue' takes the road less travelled and was one of the highlights of the springtime release whereas 'Inside' and 'This Is Where I Leave You' find Dodds improvising to scat. It is even more interesting the more out that Dodds goes. Tickets and info
Tags: