Julia Jenkins is set to take over the stage downstairs at His Majesty’s Theatre. A veteran of The Maj’s cabaret season, this will be Jenkin’s twelfth time in the program. Her popularity surely noticed by the coordinators of the cabaret program who’ve tapped Jenkins for not one but two shows.
First up Jenkins will join a host of local performers at the start of the month for Le Grand Revue Duex: Women of Rock. It’s a show that has already completely sold out. At the end of the month Jenkins will return for her solo cabaret show In These Shoes. It’s sure to be a varied trip through the works of a great many different artists ranging from Liza to Bassey and Bowie and Bob Dylan.
Variety of song material is one of the reasons Jenkins loves the cabaret format,
‘What I really love about cabaret is you can get away with doing any genre music, because there is no cabaret style of song, it’s more about the delivery of the song and telling the story,’ says Jenkins.
‘So I think you just look for songs where the lyrics are meaningful and they tell a story and anything can become a cabaret song.’
Jenkin’s show from last year’s festival focused purely on the works of Bette Midler. It’s a show that Jenkins has loved performing and there have been repeat performances at both The Court Hotel and Club West. For the new show she’s been searching further afield for works to include the program and pushing the boundaries to incorporate a wide range of material.
‘At the moment we’re still trying things out, and throwing things out, and experimenting. There’s some stuff like Charles Azvavour that you have to translate into English first before you can do them, so that’s quite challenging’, explains Jenkins, ‘Everyone knows the Piaf numbers but I think Azvanour is a little more underground.’
Amongst the tunes to be featured in the show Jenkins promised there will be a few old favourites that she’s performed before as well as some original songs from her new album that has just been released.
‘It’s going to be quite cool because the album had quite a big band on it and is quite heavily produced as where the cabaret show is just me and a piano, so we really strip things back and do them in their basic form which is going to be quite interesting’.
In These Shoes is on Downstairs at The Maj from August 17.
Graeme Watson
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