1954 - Ella, Etta, Eartha [LIVE] starring Melissa Western

Beauty, brains and a ballsy belt...

SAT 8 OCT 8PM

1954 - Ella, Etta, Eartha [LIVE]

starring Melissa Western

Swinging jazz, powerful soul and cheeky kitsch pay tribute to this magnificent era in music and inspiring trio of pioneering singers. 50s style abounds.

$25; Child $12; Conc $15; Student $15

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“Western is a force of nature...Great storyteller, feisty, highly enjoyable; … Warm, witty and supremely talented … captivating …fantastic instrumentalists”

★★★★★ Broadway Baby

“When the music stops, there is the longest silence. Then Melissa Western’s voice reappears, snatching you away again, inspiring a big grin on your face. You knew she was never gone for long, yet in that silence you still missed her.”

★★★★★ Three Weeks

At first glance Melissa Western may appear the quintessential sultry diva, but scratch a little below the surface and you soon find a brainy entrepreneur with an elastic voice and a particular addiction to research.

“I’m really quite a nerd. I can’t help researching! I’d be learning another tune sung by a gorgeous, amazing female singer and then want to know more about their life, so I’d dig and dig and be so surprised to learn about their lives” says Western. “As my understanding of the mid 50s developed I was drawn to the stories of Ella Fitzgerald, Eartha Kitt and Etta James. Though very different in their styles of music, I noticed this common thread of genre trailblazing, of three women of colour breaking glass ceilings all around them and paving the way for so many who followed after them”.

It’s these stories that fuel Western’s feast of jazz, soul and cabaret. Joining Melissa onstage is a versatile and talented all-female jazz band featuring some of Brisbane’s very best musicians.

1954: Ella, Etta, Eartha builds on the sellout success of Western’s previous jazz cabaret Oh Lady Be Good. A sellout at the Queensland Cabaret Festival, Anywhere Theatre Festival, Brisbane Jazz Club and Edinburgh Fringe, the show has won over audiences from the prestigious Brisbane City Hall Main Auditorium to the Jumpers & Jazz Festival in Warwick.

Having toured around the world to the Speigeltent at the Canterbury Festival, a UK tour (Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire), Brisbane Jazz Club, Maleny Arts Council, Gold Coast Jazz and Blues Festival and more Melissa and her top notch jazz team are over the moon to be presenting a brand new cabaret in 2022.