Domingo 23 Nov 2014, 10:55

Davod Azad's music seems to be divided between straight forward Iranian/Azerbaijani traditional music and more experimental stuff, such as the poems by the Sufi poet Rumi that he set to music by Johann Sebastian Bach some years ago.

Last night's concert, grandly titled Sat 22 Nov – On the Wings of Global Improvisation fell into the latter category. The master was accompanied by musicians who came from Romany folk, jazz and Indian Classical backgrounds. Some of the improvisations that followed were a bit hit and miss, but when it worked it was superb with the second half of the concert being especially good.

Davood Azad's voice is a bit lower, a bit less sweet than when I last heard him (but that was around a decade ago) but it is still one of the most spiritual experiences i can imagine. Live too, he has an energy that doesn't fully come across on recordings.

The accompanying musicians were very good, although i couldn't make my mind up about the tabla player or whether the tabla in this context really worked (shame because the tabla is generally one of my favourite instruments). My wife was particularly impressed with the sax player (but i think that may be because she loves the instrument).

My main criticism around the concert was around its promotion, which seemed to be a bit poor. I only heard about the event by chance and an Iranian friend who makes a point of always going to hear Azad when he appears in London knew nothing about it till I happened to tell her. This probably explained why the auditorium was only about half full, whereas other Davod Azad concerts i've been to have been packed out.

There were no CDs for sale either, which was unusual and the compere, who gave forth at length, appeared to speak no English (just as well that Azad himself seems to speak the language fluently). To be honest most of the crowd did appear to be from Iran - but that points back to issues around its promotion again, because this hasn't been the case at other concerts.