The Wife and I had been thinking of heading back down to Oamaru for a weekend visit for some time. She had stayed with a friend at a wonderful holiday house near the old part of town and wanted us to spend a weekend together down there checking out the old town and it's funky buildings and shops. The COVID lockdown had put paid to that plan for a while but as normality had resumed and work is plentiful, it was decided to go, the only decision left was when. Fate decided when browsing Facebook one day, a post came up from Nadia Reid announcing a show in Oamaru in about three weeks from the day I saw it and so I quickly checked availability of accommodation and gig tickets and all fell into place.
The show was on the Friday night and she was doing an early and a late show. We were booked for the late show. The Grainstore Gallery is housed in an old 19th century Victorian Oamaru stone grain store, on the upper floor. The Gallery is run by a local artist and is full to overflowing with arty type stuff for purchase, but they seem to have had quite a few local NZ musicians play there. A pretty funky venue.
Nadia was supported on this night by her old friend Flora Knight, of whom I had hear of but had not seen play before. Flora is a fiddle player and did a great little set of old-time fiddle tunes that she had learned on her travels in America and I suspect she is quite familiar with some of Harry Smiths Anthology Of American Music. I am pretty sure I recognized a couple of tunes she played and defiantly knew the song Cindy Cindy from Nick Cave's version of the song. She played a great set of some slower ballads and some foot stomping hoedowns. Yeehaw!!
Nadia played for over an hour. She played mostly her acoustic guitar with some beautifully subtle support from and electric guitar played by a bloke who's name I don't recall now, but it was just wonderful. Her singing was delicate but powerful as she presented an array of her songs spanning her three albums. Although I am still not intimate with all her music, I have now been exposed to it enough to recognize several tunes and appreciate them even deeper in the live setting, and it was a lovely intimate setting and gig with maybe less than 100 people present. A Stunning gig.
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