Review: "BLACK TIE" at the School Of Arts Cafe, August 1997. Reviewed by Tony Magee

Mo Awards winners Black Tie are a cabaret group consisting of Valerie, Yuri, Susan and Con Mavridis - two brothers and their wives.

Black Tie present an evening of music that encompasses a huge variety of genres and styles, one unifying aspect being that it is all extremely polished, very well performed and a fabulous night's entertainment.

Valerie is a first class pianist and accompanies the others together with Susan on Cello. Yuri and Con are both bass-baritones although Con has much more of a serious operatic voice, whilst Yuri's is lighter and better suited to music theatre.

Some highlights from the evening were a beautiful rendition of John Denver's Perhaps Love by Yuri and Con, a wonderful Russian Medley which included Dark Eyes and (what became in the West) Those Were the Days and two pieces from Gershwin's Porgy and Bess - I Got Plenty o' Nuttin' sung by Yuri and It Ain't Necessarily So sung by Con. One odd moment in the show is Con's rendition of Modern Major General from Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance. Not an overly convincing version , particularly when I Am the Pirate King is sitting begging to be sung, mostly because it would have been so much more suitable.

One aspect of the group which I find particularly outstanding is how the vocal accompanists are also featured as solo artists to an equal degree. Highlights within this arena included Manuel de Falla's Ritual Fire Dance and what for me was the highlight of the whole evening, an abridged version of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 (ie: all three movements joined together). Now you have to remember that both these pieces are scored for piano and orchestra, and in the case of the Rachmaninoff, the piano is the solo instrument. The arrangements by Valerie that she and Susan played were quite remarkable in the fullness of sound they recreated and the number of musical lines that were retained and brought out - testament to both the excellent arrangements and the high quality of playing.

I would like to see a small amount of tightening up between numbers in the show - nothing wrong with friendly chat, but I feel that too much did cause the show as a whole to drag slightly and in fact give the impression of the evening being a touch too long.

Originally published in Muse Magazine (Canberra), September 1997