Stephanie
Mel Cooke, Gleaner Writer
Stephanie was a wonderful surprise in Strength of a Woman, her concert at Redbones Blues Café, New Kingston, on Saturday night.
Scheduled to begin at 8:30 p.m., the concert did not get going until 9:35 p.m. Compounding the late start was Stephanie taking pains to attach a cream-coloured scarf to the microphone stand when she came on stage. At this point, it seemed that self-indulgence and histrionics would be the order of the night.
Her opening spiel about the strength of woman ("There is an inner beauty about a woman who believes in herself") did not help, and The Gleaner settled in for what appeared would be an average experience at best. It was not.
Stephanie Wallace-Maxwell (during the latter part of the concert she pointed out that she is Mrs Maxwell, her husband, Stephen, on keyboards in the three-man band) turned out to be not an excellent singer with a memorable voice, but also one who takes on unexpected material. So, for example, when she took on a couple tracks from the Tuff Gong in the post-intermission hour, Stephanie did not go for the expected and overdone - instead, she took on So Much Trouble in the World and Guiltiness, to excellent results.
Enthused Audience
Speaking about the attributes of a strong woman at points during the concert, Stephanie led an average-sized but suitably enthused audience with songs as diverse as Whitney Houston's He Fills Me Up, and Supercat's Mud Up, done with a healthy helping of humour; Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the Heart and Tenor Saw's Ring the Alarm. And, of course, there were Stephanie's own songs. The high-quality, very enjoyable concert ending with a pair of her latest singles, which in themselves showed her diversity - one a heavy roots rocker for which she said she had sought the production services of Sly and Robbie.
And early in the second half Stephanie delivered a pair of tracks whose pop nature she explained after doing the songs, that they are material she has written in the songwriter capacity she is signed at a company in the United States.
Coupled with Stephanie's voice and control of her performance, which was obviously well rehearsed, with smooth transitions, was the quality of the band (although a small unit) and the harmony trio, which was in good nick. It did not hurt that Stephanie wore her simple yet elegant black dress well, the shoes came off eventually and she did the second segment barefooted. And she has an engaging female physical attribute - definition in her calf muscles.
But it was her vocal chords that the audience was interested in, and with good reason. Whether she was doing an ultra-slow version of Lonely Stays on My Mind or delivering the uptempo urging to say my name (which was morphed with Ini Kamoze's Stepping Hotter This Year), taking the high notes a la Houston or getting the audience to sing along on two occasions, Stephanie's voice did not lose its quality and character.
And there was a good two-song cameo from Tony, moving across from harmony vocals, to put style, swagger and a Shaggy-style voice into the title track of the concert, followed by Marley's Waiting in Vain.
