Following two years of complete sell out shows at this Kings Road venue, Nicky sings a new set of songs from some of his most loved song writers such as Cole Porter, Kurt Weill, Rodgers and Hart and Irving Berlin, along with that of their Broadway contemporaries, some of it hauntingly familiar, some less well-known.
Accompanying Nicky will be his trio, including a double bass player and cellist and his musical director the pianist supremo Tom Wakeley, with whom he has played many public and private engagements both abroad and in the United Kingdom, including in front of Her Majesty the Queen.
Nicky first learned many of these songs when laid up with polio for several years in childhood. “We had all those albums of 78s. I was word-perfect in Ethel Merman by the time I was eight” he says.
Living in New York in the 1960s, he knew the city’s musical icons from Porter and Richard Rogers, Comden and Green, to Sinatra, Joe Bushkin and Duke Ellington. He heard great cabaret artists such as Lena Horne, Louis Armstrong and Bobby Short, and his particular favorite Lee Wiley; he also danced to the flawless sounds of Lester Lanin and Xavier Cugat.
All these masters of lyric and rhythm have influenced Nicky’s style. This is evident in his recent CD, Midnight Matinee, on which he performs with Bryan Ferry, Helena Bonham Carter and the late Cilla Black among others. About Midnight Matinee Bob Geldof wrote “Nicky has shown us all how it should be done”.
Definitely shows not to be missed. Expect some fine, beautiful songs, entertaining and scandalous anecdotes and a lot of name-dropping and revelations