The Oberlin Review
<< Front page Arts September 14, 2007

Roche and Williams Take Finney
 
Smooth and sultry: Williams crooned her way into her audience’s hearts with her unique blend of folk and pop.
 

At times, the humble take the crown, unwittingly and without gesture. So it seemed to be at the Dar Williams concert last Saturday when Lucy Wainwright Roche, OC ’03, took the stage and won the crowd’s heart before Williams even appeared. However, judging by sheer volume, Williams was still more cheer-worthy.

This was not Roche’s first time back on campus since graduating. Her most notable past appearance was as the opening act to the Roches, a band composed of her mother and her two aunts. Her greatest asset is her sweet, smooth and trained voice that glides easily over her simple acoustic sets. Roche sang several covers — including a song from the musical Hair — and gave the crowd a sampling of her first EP, 8 Songs.

She brought Williams prematurely from the depths of Finney to harmonize on a cover of Richard Shindell’s “The Next Best Western.” Williams collaborated with Shindell and Lucy Kaplansky to make an album, Cry Cry Cry, which might explain the readiness for Roche to pick up Shindell’s songs.

After all Roche’s charm, Williams’s entrance in a change of costume was rather jarring. However, she slid into the set with “Calling the Moon,” and then played “The Babysitter’s Here,” in acknowledged deference to Roche, who at one point babysat Williams’s son. Often, Williams would precede a song with a story, which is usually a nice way to engage with the audience. But many times I had no idea how the song was connected to the story. We were entertained but confused.

Williams played through her first few songs, but really came to life once she hit a group of songs from her 1996 sophomore album, Mortal City. Not surprisingly, the crowd also livened up; songs such as “The Ocean” and “The Christians and the Pagans” elicited enormous cheers. This is not to mention her lovely rendition of her own song “Iowa,” sung with Roche on harmony. Finney glowed with audience members’ “symbols of interconnectivity,” as Williams dubbed our cell phones, while the two became quiet to hear the crowd sing along.

Songs from Williams’s more recent records, such as The Beauty of the Rain, released in 2003, show that her songwriting talents have not waned as she ages. Her performance of “The Mercy of the Fallen” was evidence of her practiced musicianship: her voice jumped the melody’s octave without faltering.

Certainly a name known on campus, Williams gave fans what they expected. Many devotees could be seen dancing in the aisles as the concert came to an end.

However, her ability to reach those who had not previously heard her music may have been weaker than Roche’s.

For those going in blind, it was easy to fall into the trance of Roche’s girlish voice and hesitant stage presence, only to be somewhat shocked by the appearance of one so stage-worn and self-assured as Williams.

Perhaps it would be in Williams’s best interest to take a cue from her opening act, and begin to cultivate at least the traces of humility.


 
 
   

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