I am way overdue for giving you all a catch up on many of the latest developments in town. One notable one is the new group that started at the beginning of the month at the Shangri-la in Pudong. The ground floor jazz/cigar bar there, with its creative and original name “The Bar” now features the superb vocal talents of Australian vocalist Emma Franz. Accompanying her for a four-month stint is the subtly and ingeniously named group of players they call “The Band.” The Band is made up of Shanghai’s own locally based jazzmen, with Lawrence Ku on guitar, Scott Dodd on bass, Toby Mak on trumpet, and Ronnie Williams playing the drums.
The hotel held a promotional party for the band on October 12 to celebrate the new group’s arrival, at which I thoroughly enjoyed the amazing desserts and other free food. Oh, and the music was good too. The hotel PR people were nice enough to give me a few photos their photographer shot, and I found it strange at first that they gave me mostly pictures focused on Emma only (who is certainly quite lovely of course) while the rest of the band members are fuzzy in the background. However, I realized afterwards that it makes perfect sense, as most listeners in a hotel jazz lounge barely notice there even IS a band behind the singer. Let alone listen to it. So it’s really just reflecting the reality of many people’s perception. Anyway I can’t complain since they’re sure better pictures than I can take.
This band is hot- check them out. Our dear friend Genevieve, who was singing there for the four months prior to The Band taking over, has returned to her hometown of beautiful Detroit, USA, for a month before she goes down to Shangri-la Hong Kong for another contract.