YOKO Ono has picked Liverpool’s Sense of Sound choir to sing alongside Patti Smith, Boy George and Siouxsie Sioux in the first ever live performance of the album Double Fantasy.
They will be performing an acapella version of Every Man Has A Woman Who Loves Him, and say they are “thrilled” to be taking part in next weekend’s event (Sunday June 23) at the Royal Festival Hall.
Double Fantasy remains as haunting an album as it was 32 years ago. A toast to the good life, John Ono Lennon style. After an absence of five years from the music scene, the ex-Beatle turned stay-at-home Manhattan dad was letting the world know he had buried his demons.
Sense Of Sound
Accompanied by Ono who composed and performed several of the tracks, and with optimistic compositions like Starting Over, Beautiful Boy, Woman and Clean Up Time, it was time to go back out and tell the world what he had discovered about the stuff that newly mattered.
Before Lennon had the chance to show more of his maturity, his fate was fatally sealed three weeks after the album’s November 1980 release.
Now Double Fantasy is being revived, live, for Meltdown, an annual festival of music, art, performance and film, curated, this time, by Ono, at London’s Southbank Centre.
Previous Meltdown directors include Elvis Costello, David Bowie, Patti Smith, Lee Scratch Perry, Morrissey, Jarvis Cocker, Nick Cave, Scott Walker, John Peel and Ornette Coleman.
Fan
This year’s 11-day Meltdown runs from Friday June 14 and culminates in a spectacular performance of the album, whose line up also boasts Ono herself, son Sean Lennon, Patrick Wolf, and singing/songwriting/sitar sensation Bishi Bhattacharya.
Jennifer John, who manages the singers, said: “When the show’s musical director, David Coulter (who is also a Sense Of Sound patron), contacted me to say he would love us to be part of the line up for Meltdown I was totally thrilled.
“I’m a huge fan of the Double Fantasy album and also being able to represent Liverpool at such a high level concert meant that the quality of the work that we continue to create and deliver translates onto a world class stage.
“All of the artists involved have been asked to perform their own interpretations of specific songs from the album. We have been asked to do this with the track, Every Man Has A Woman Who Loves Him and in rehearsals it has been sounding amazing.”
*Sense of Sound Singers will also be performing at the opening concert for this year’s Liverpool International Music Festival on Friday 23rd August at Sefton Park opening for the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.
