On a summer's evening, the braying and hooting of the drunken punters downstairs in the street floats up through the open windows, along with gusts of cigarette smoke. It's the seasonal backdrop to the offerings of Scaledown, that semi-secret night in central London that is always surprising, sometimes grating, sometimes inspiring, sometimes wonderful, and just the best place to be on a Friday evening. Street lighting seeps through the windows as dusk falls, and the excruciatingly bright yellow of the chandeliers battles with it to illuminate intense performers, often hunched over their guitars, keyboards and consoles.
Earlier, we'd been to the Farsight Gallery to see a photographic exhibition that included a black and white photo of the Tin Tabernacle in Kilburn (a whole mind adventure there), and sat in the little park behind St Gile's Church where we were befriended by a robin. We'd also witnessed a bizarre rock video session outside a guitar shop at the end of Denmark Street (a weekly occurrence, apparently). The streets were crammed with tourists, but we were within walking distance of the King and Queen, home of Scaledown.
Sometimes it's packed, sometimes it's sparsely attended. Churlishly, performers frequently exit with their supporters as soon as they've played, which means that the final act often plays to six people or less- or not at all, because the rules on time keeping are vague, and several times I've been there and the last act has had to go home, hands-empty. The leaving-after-you've-played thing is very 'open mic' and really, performers at a quirky night like this ought to know better. But reader, I confess, we left early because my poorly lungs could not cope with the intrusive smoke.
So what was last night's fare? A jazz trio that featured a baritone sax (oh those low notes!) a rookie bassplayer who had mastered the ability to walk his basslines, and a female singer who wrought miracles out of a tiny keyboard just one stage up from miniature, and who had a truly lovely voice; Sylvia Balducci, an Italian singer and campaigner who I used to teach many aeons ago, who sang a set of beautiful and committed Chilean songs from a forthcoming album; a guitarist who wrung a smattering of short and evocative tiny instrumentals out of a Spanish guitar; and finally, Haymanot Tesfa singing two very intricate Ethiopian song accompanying herself on the krar. All of this was threaded together by Mark, Lucy and Kevin, who were just as fascinated by the music as the audience were.
At several points in the evening I thought 'There is no other place that I want to be but here'.
