As bio music shows go, and each year heralds a new series of them, AT LAST: THE ETTA JAMES STORY is a  stand-out.

Everything was first class:- Josh Livings script, Vika Bull’s exceptional performance as the great Afro American singer Etta James (born Jamesetta Hawkins in 1938, died in Los Angeles in 2012), a 6 time Grammy Award winning contralto singer successfully mastered a range of musical genres including blues, rhythm and blues, soul, gospel and jazz, and the great support Vika received from a red hot seven piece band, aptly called the ‘Essential R and B Band’.

So many great songs rendered perfectly,-‘YOU REALLY GOT A HOLD ON ME’, ‘A SUNDAY KIND OF LOVE’, ‘I’D RATHER GO BLIND’ and ‘AT LAST’.

Vika movingly narrated Etta’s tough journey, she had a life-long battle with hard drugs which she recounted in her biography RAGE TO SURVIVE, co-authored with David Ritz, along with trumpet player, Tibor Gyapjas.

On opening night, Vika and the band came back on stage to a standing ovation to deliver one last song, an Eagles classic TAKE IT TO THE LIMIT, a particular favourite of Etta’s.

Vika remarked to the audience, ‘now that Etta’s passed on, I can see her playing with a funky band in Heaven, and the power of their music is making the Angels weep’.

A touching final note to a wonderful evening.

AT LAST: THE ETTA JAMES STORY, starring Vika Bull and the Essential R and B Band, opened at the Playhouse Theatre, Sydney Opera House on Tuesday 30th April and ran until Sunday 5th May, 2013.

© David Kary

5th May, 2013

Tags: Sydney Music Reviews- AT LAST: THE ETTA JAMES STORY, The Playhouse, Sydney Opera House, Vika Bull, Sydney Arts Guide, David Kary