Review by Brian Wise
RUFUS WAINWRIGHT
Melbourne Recital Centre, Saturday January 11, 2025
While he comes from a famous musical family, it is possible to argue that Rufus Wainwright has become the pre-eminent representative of the entire Wainwright-McGarrigle clan. His stunning performance this evening would be one strong piece of evidence. The sheer breadth of his music and his projects, from pop and folk all the way to opera, would also support the contention. And, if you needed any other evidence, then the fervent devotion of his audience is utterly compelling.
On his first visit to Australia in 2005, Wainwright took part in the star-studded tribute to Leonard Cohen, Came So far For Beauty (later to be made into a film). By that time, he had already released four acclaimed albums and was on his way to becoming an icon. Twenty years and multiple projects later, Wainwright’s career boasts a range of music that few artists ever approach – apart from perhaps Paul McCartney and Elvis Costello – and a catalogue of songs that chronicle his own emotional life journey in all its raw honesty.
When Rufus Wainwright strode onto stage, sat at a grand piano and launched into ‘Agnus Dei’, a selection from his opera Dream Requiem, it was an immediate sign that this would be a special evening. There are not many solo performers who can hold an audience spellbound for an hour and a half with just a piano and a guitar and an absolutely stunning voice. Wainwright is in an exclusive club here. It is a much more difficult art than it might appear. In fact, after so many much-hyped recent stadium and arena shows in this town it was incredibly refreshing to see a solo musician playing what I could only think of as ‘real’ music without any unnecessary embellishments.
Of course, Rufus is nothing, if not dramatic and there are also very few musicians who can wear a black boiler suit and, with minimal added bling, make it look fashionable! He is also fiercely honest and there is never the sense that his on-stage patter has been rehearsed; it is as if each audience gets a slightly different version of the artist.
After the rather grand opening, Wainwright explains that a live recording of Dream Requiem, from the Paris premiere last June with Meryl Streep narrating, would be released on January 17. Then to drop another name heavily onto the audience he noted that a performance in Los Angeles next month will feature Jane Fonda as the narrator. Wainwright then added that he had been distracted over recent days by news of the fires in Los Angeles and that while his house was safe his thoughts were with those who were not so lucky.
‘Out of The Game’, from the 2012 album of the same name contrasted starkly with ‘He Loved’, a song from his second opera, Hadrian. Wainwright explained that he has modified the format of the songs so that he could include it on a limited-edition vinyl version of his album Roadtrip Elegies – The McCabes Live Session, which was available in the foyer (though sold out swiftly). After this, ‘The Art Teacher’ continued to demonstrate how Wainwright can skip seamlessly from one style to another.
We were then treated to a new song, ironically titled ‘Old Song’, inspired by Wainwright’s love of Kurt Weill’s work and the era which spawned it, an era in which he claims that ‘everybody was miserable.’ (The song will be appearing on a forthcoming studio album sometime this year). This segued into ‘Early Morning Madness’, a song about overcoming addiction that appeared on the 2020 studio album Unfollow The Rules.
At this point in the evening Wainwright called on support act Folk Bitch Trio – Jeanie Pilkington, Gracie Sinclair, and Heide Peverelle – to join him for a bracket of four songs from the 2023 Folkocracy album. Rufus pointed out several times that it had been nominated for a Grammy but only missed out because it was in the year that Joni Mitchell and Paul Simon released albums).
Folk Bitch Trio had opened the evening with a mesmerising 30-minute set that featured gorgeous harmonies set against exceptionally interesting lyrics that make their songs totally distinctive. It is easy to predict huge things ahead based on the audience reaction alone, and I suggest that most there would have been hearing them for the first time.
‘Down in the Willow Garden’ led into a delightful rendition of Neil Young’s ‘Harvest’, quite different from the studio recording as the trio took verses as well. ‘High on a Rocky Ledge’ was suitably dramatic and intriguing, having been credited to the curious American composer and musician Moondog. ‘Going to a Town’ was as close as Rufus got to political comment, restraining himself during the evening with just a few barbed remarks and trusting the audience to understand what he felt about US politics (earlier he had effusively praised Australia). “I’m going to a town that has already been burnt down,” he sings. “I’m so tired of you, America.” While the song was originally recorded for Release The Stars in 2007, its sentiments are still totally relevant. That bracket alone should have people revisiting the brilliant Folkocracy album.
After ‘Gay Messiah’ and ‘Go or Go Ahead’ there was another stunning bracket of four songs headed by the Leonard Cohen classic ‘So Long, Marianne’ given an expectedly jaunty air leading into ‘Poses.’ After talking about the reconciliation between himself and his father, Rufus dedicated ‘Dinner At Eight’ to him as ‘a love song’ and closed the set with ‘Cigarettes and Chocolate.’ The repertoire had neatly encapsulated Wainwright’s entire career.
Wainwright returned for a song in French, struggling to recall the words. However, the evening wouldn’t have been complete without a version of ‘Hallelujah’ for which he invited Folk Bitch Trio back onto the stage to share the vocals again. (He didn’t mention that he had recently called Donald Trump’s use at rallies of his version of the Cohen classic as ‘blasphemous’).
It was a perfect end to a sublime evening.
SET LIST
Agnus Dei
Vibrate
Out of the Game
He Loved
Peaceful Afternoon
The Art Teacher
Old Song / Early Morning Madness
Down in the Willow Garden (with Folk Bitch Trio)
Harvest (Neil Young) (with Folk Bitch Trio)
High on a Rocky Ledge (Moondog) (with Folk Bitch Trio)
Going to a Town (with Folk Bitch Trio)
Gay Messiah
Go or Go Ahead
So Long, Marianne (Leonard Cohen)
Poses
Dinner at Eight
Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk
Encore:
La Complainte de la Butte (Jean Renoir)
Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen) (With Folk Bitch Trio)