Rebecca Ferguson review, Bridgewater Hall Manchester 24/10/2016

Rebecca Ferguson was little known to me and I was kindly given these tickets by my friend Nadia Clarke due to her being away of the date of the gig. The only prior knowledge I had of Rebecca Ferguson came from hearing her song ‘Nothing’s Real But Love’ and a vague notion that she had participated in The X Factor at some point in her life (Wikipedia tells me she was on it in 2010, and came second.) So my PA and I drove to Manchester to the sound of her Spotify playlist, determined to learn the lyrics to or at least familiarise ourselves with a couple of her songs.

As it turned out, we had more than ample time to study in the car as the sat nav made us circle much of Manchester before we parked and because of this we had to park in a NCP car park which cost an eye-watering £17! There is disabled parking available but it had to be pre-booked and we did not have enough time to do this making this option inaccessible for us.

We also didn’t see anything of the ample menus the Bridgewater Hall website boasts and our only dinner options from I believe the Stalls Bar were a couple of pieces of overpriced pizza and Twixes – there’s a minimum spend to pay when using a card too. Maybe it’s a case of fail to plan is to plan to fail, I’m going back in December for The Sound of Musicals so I will endeavour – and implore you – not to make the same mistakes.

There were strobes and haze that could potentially affect fans with epilepsy but this was well-advertised around the venue.

Rebecca Ferguson herself did not come on till close to 9:30pm (not the advertised start time of 7:30pm) but when she did it was with a bang. Her songs included Mistress from her latest album, Superwoman and the toe-tapping I Hope (from the older album, Freedom). The repetitive chorus of this song made if both catchy and easy to learn, and she also catered for newer fans with a rendition of the c Chaka Khan’s classic: I’m Every Woman.

Overall it was a lovely night even if hectic at first, and while I’m not sure I’m a loyal Ferguson fan, Bridgewater Hall do host many musical theatre stars whom I admire so in the words of Arnold Schwarzenegger: hasta la vista baby, I’ll be back!

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