Blake Raise The Kenton Roof With Festive Show
Classical singers, Blake brought their Christmas magic back to the Kenton on Monday evening, raising the roof with their incredible voices and stunning harmonies. Their show in Henley was just one of a few dates they have done this year.
The trio, Ollie Baines, Stephen Bowman and Humphrey Berney as well has having such a lovely charismatic presence on stage; they all have a great sense of fun and humour they show off between their songs. They opened the show by apologising for the lack of heating in the theatre and that they had used everything they could think of to radiate some heat including toasters!”
They opened the show with It’s Beginning to Look Like Christmas and after singing When a Child is Born the humour continued with mocking a couple who were latecomers to the show saying “It was like the Christmas journey, the door opened just when the child was born.”
The show continued with Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, I’ll be Home for Christmas and the first song they ever released Hallelujah. The first half also included a non Christmas songs Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol.
They recalled that when they came to the Kenton in 2007 they said they would love to come and do Henley Festival. Their wish came true 2016 when they headlined with Dame Shirley Bassey. They spoke fondly of their visits to Henley remarking that “the audiences here are quality people and love the intimate theatre.”
The second half opened with a beautiful a cappella rendition of the carol Silent Night.
The audience got their chance to sing along in Frosty the Snowman with Ollie’s part “thump, thumpety, thump”. The snowman theme continued with Walking in the Air from The Snowman film showing behind them.
The highlight for us was Nessun Dorma which was sung so effortlessly with the high notes hitting the roof and saw the audience burst into huge applause afterwards.
The show finished with Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire and an encore of the perfect song White Christmas.
Blake certainly didn’t disappoint and you see why they have wowed legions of fans around the globe, selling over a million albums and scored No. 1 hits in ten countries. We hope they’ll come back to the Kenton again.
