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Katie Melua and The Gori Women’s Choir took to Liverpool’s Philharmonic Hall stage and blessed the audience with an evening of culture, warmth and real artistic depth.
The stage was set with a beautiful backdrop of silent video as Katie opened with ‘You Are So Beautiful’ – a mesmerising performance in her native Georgian language.
Her voice accompanied by the band and beautiful backdrops smashed any language barriers. Almost effortlessly it filled the room with warmth and a strong sense of solidarity.
Katie, her guitar and band, made up of a bass player, drummer, keyboardist and her brother Zurab on electric guitar played a number of songs, most notably to the room ‘Nine Million Bicycles’ and ‘Just like heaven’ before welcoming ‘The Gori’s Women’s’ Choir.
They sang together and the pairing was beautiful, it was simple yet stunning all at once. Katie told of how she met and came to sing with the choir, they too from Georgia, whom she has collaborated with for ‘In Winter’.
Katie continued share her admiration for the talents of the choir, before standing with them to sing her favorite Christmas Carol which she dubbed as ‘…the most beautiful…’ ‘O Holy Night’.
The audience made up of all ages and backgrounds became even more emerged in the sense of peace and harmony Katie’s voice, paired with the choir gave. The Christmas Trees that had been in darkness beforehand lit up with the stage as they sang together.
The Gori’s Women’s choir conducted by Shalva Mosidze, performed a piece as Katie looked on and afterwards she stood to their side and sang ‘Carol of The Bells’.
As the night drew to a close, the choir left the stage and Katie performed some of her more well-known songs such as ‘Closest Thing To Crazy’ and her rendition of ‘Diamonds Are Forever’.
She welcomed the choir back to sing once more with her before teasing a close with ‘Fields of Gold’. As she left the stage the applause echoed and grew more and more sincere, she returned this time to close and left the crowd with a cover of ‘What a Wonderful World’.
Katie thanked the choir, her opening act, noting how hard it is to be a woman standing alone with her guitar, thanked her band and applauded them as individuals and finally thanked Liverpool for its rich musical culture.
She left the stage to a standing ovation and a sea of applause that continued long after she had gone.
Katie, 34 hit the UK’s number one back in December 2007 with “A Wonderful World” and has had numerous singles in the charts since.
Those returning home from The Philharmonic spoke of the calm, blissful feeling they were leaving with and hoped to see her perform again soon.
Katie’s performance, enriched by the whole production was simply angelic.