Norwich Review

Heather Small
ANDY RUSSELL

Last updated: 28/05/2009 08:50:00

Norwich Theatre Royal

Velvety-voiced diva Heather Small had Norwich rocking big time last night.

The singer, who found fame fronting M People, had the audience bopping after they were encouraged to turn the theatre into a dance hall.

Heather, who has one of the most distinctive and powerful voices in the music industry and multi-million record sales to her name, belted out a varied set including her favourite songs like Heartbreak Hotel, a beautiful version of Summertime and Elkie Brooks's Pearl's a Singer as well as jazz and blues numbers - all showing the extraordinary richness of her voice.

And anyone who finds live performances sometimes disap-pointing has never seen Heather, for throughout her energetic perfor-mance you could hear every word with no chance of her being drowned out by the superb Snake Davis Band, led expertly by the man himself on saxophone, and ringing applause.

But it was the M People hits that stole the show and the audience needed no encouragement to sing along to classic tracks, including Search for the Hero (which she dedicated to a man fighting cancer), Moving On Up, One Night in Heaven, Sight for Sore Eyes, How Can I Love You More and Someday.

But she reserved her biggest solo hit - Proud - for a richly-deserved encore and standing ovation.

She was supported by flautist Lucy Noble and her band which had really got the audience going.

Heather Small - big voice, big personality and big popularity. You did Norwich proud.