Laughing Matters: Trio of Irish stand-up comedians bring celtic humour to Hong Kong

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A trio of Irish stand-up comedians bring Celtic humour to Hong Kong

Three Irish comedians are here to paint the town green, writes P. Ramakrishnan

P.Ramakrishnan

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Keith Farnan.

Hong Kong comedy fans will have a bit of the luck of the Irish when three comics from the Emerald Isle, P.J. Gallagher, Keith Farnan and Andrew Stanley, take to the stage of the Punchline Comedy Club this month.

And the Gaelic proverb "when the tongue slips, it speaks the truth" is sure to resonate as the funny men put their spin on life as we know it.

Gallagher is perhaps the best known of the trio. As the star of television shows Next Week's News and Naked Camera he has found fans beyond Ireland. "My first TV series, Naked Camera, was a hidden-camera show set in Dublin and it was the best fun I've ever had," Gallagher says.
Andrew Stanley.
"I love making TV shows and being part of a team working together to make something. Stand-up comedy is great, but you are always ultimately on your own and hoping for the best. With TV you really get the feeling that you are building something and can always revisit it, I love that side of it. I also like the idea that you are performing to people in their own houses. It's like a personal little show that everyone can be a part of."

In his current show, two of the more popular characters have been a mentally unstable taxi driver and the wickedly fun "Dirty Auld One", an elderly woman who makes wildly inappropriate sexual innuendoes. It's obvious that Gallagher finds inspiration in both the marvellous and the mundane.

"My family is very funny, but they have no idea. I suppose the funniest people never really think they're funny and they can even get angry if you point it out to them," he says. "My mother is the funniest person I've ever met, mad as a box of frogs too, but I'd never change her.

"I've got no idea what my first joke was, but I'll bet it was me impersonating someone off TV from the '80s. Comedy was so much easier when I was six and the audience was my parents."
But humour can also come from dark places. Many comedians who have experienced tough times have managed to transform this into comedy gold, but Gallagher says he found a different route. "I think the day-to-day stuff is where the real humour is," he says.
P.J. Gallagher.
"Everyone is doing something funny, and it's fun to try and find out what it is. I know a lot of comics who have great stories about personal triumphs and tragedies, but I want my gigs to be a break from all that. I like the idea of a stand-up show just being an hour of fun where you don't have to think about anything other than laughing."

When it comes to his heroes of humour, Gallagher names Jason Byrne as his "adopted comedy dad". "Jason Byrne is pretty much the reason I do comedy at all. He's the best live stand-up I've ever seen and turns so much material around every year that it's unreal. He started booking me for gigs long before I thought I was ready and coached me into being a stand-up."

With his Twitter feed dominated by photos of dogs and bikes, there's obviously more to Gallagher's life than funny business.
"Racing bikes and my dogs are my two first loves," says Gallagher. "I really only ever started telling jokes so I could buy bikes and parts. I love dogs a lot too, and they feature in my stand-up a fair bit. I actually really like all animals and I'm a vegetarian. I still eat fish though, because they are idiots. Kind of like fruit with gills."


Punchline Comedy Club featuring P.J. Gallagher, Keith Farnan and Andrew Stanley March 13, 8pm, March 14, 9pm, Tamarind, 2/F Sun Hung Kai Centre, 30 Harbour Road, Wan Chai; March 15, 9pm, Grappa's Cellar, B/F Jardine House, 1 Connaught Place, Central, all shows HK$320. Inquiries: punchlinecomedy.com


From SCMP.com
http://www.scmp.com/magazines/48hrs/article/1442937/trio-irish-stand-comedians-bring-celtic-humour-hong-kong

Divine Inspiration: Sonu Nigam: India's greatest Singer lands in Hong Kong

Sonu Nigam

It is the symbiosis between performer and audience that makes live shows so special, Indian vocalist Sonu Nigam tells P.Ramakrishnan.

Sonu Nigam is widely regarded to be the best male singer in India. But when reminded of this, he demurs, "That's very kind of you to say but it is not true. There are so many great musical talents in India. I'm just happy to be a part of the scene."

Still, Nigam's vast repertoire of multilingual renditions has won him a fan base that includes influential vocalists from Kerala to Kashmir, be they singers of vintage Bollywood numbers (K.J. Yesudas, Manna Dey, the Mangeshkar sisters) or contemporary stars (Shreya Ghoshal, Sunidhi Chauhan, KK). they all speak of the 40-year-old with deep admiration. He's even done a remix with Britney Spears....

Songs for the Soul: Interview with Pakistani legend Rahat Fateh Ali Khan: Maestro!

Pakistani singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan hails from a family with a 600-year musical heritage, writes P.Ramakrishnan. 


RAHAT FATEH ALI KHAN may be the nephew of the late, great Pakistani musician Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, but he carries the burden of that vast musical legacy with ease. He is calm and relaxed as we chat about his upcoming show in Hong Kong next month.

Known for his immense singing range, Khan is softly spoken in conversation.

The singer has more than a few of the mannerisms and musical phrasings of his uncle and readily admits that Nusrat had a major influence on him. "I feel I was blessed to be born into his household; I learned so much just by watching him," he says. "When I was little, I would accompany him to shows, and sometimes I would perform with him. I never got stage fright. I was always ready to perform, to sit under the arc lights and sing. As a youngster, I tried to copy his style, but now I have developed my own."

Most South Asian music lovers are familiar with Khan's richly layered voice. He is a popular singer in Pakistan, but has also contributed to the soundtracks of several wildly successful Bollywood films. His repertoire covers everything from devotional and romantic to classical and traditional.

"While others might have found studying music a chore, it never was for me. Like my uncle, I find music divine. It is my way of connecting to the almighty. I love to perform contemporary film songs, but I also like qawwali [Sufi devotional music]. There's a spiritual aspect to it that is indescribable."

That also explains why Khan refrains from anything vulgar, or even singing a syllable that has a double entendre. "I like to sing a good tune, but the lyrics tend to be the most important factor for me. I like to know what the song is trying to say. I have sung many songs in Hindi films, but my favourites are Main Jahaan Rahoon [ Wherever I Live] and Jiya Dhadak Dhadak [ My Heart Beats]. There are verses in those songs that are so profound, that I can sing them again and again. I sing them all around the world, and never tire of them."

Khan began his career at a very young age. "I don't know how I had the bravado to start so early," he says with a laugh. "But, as you know, I come from a family of musicians that goes back over 600 years. I know of no life other than this; music is my be all and end all. It has no barriers, and it transcends all borders.

Music also crosses the political divide between Pakistan and India, he says: "I have met Indian stars and singers, and they have shown me immeasurable warmth and affection. This respect is mutual. The music thwarts the politics."

Many bemoan the fact that youngsters have been tempted by Western culture. They worry that these influences are corroding the subcontinent's musical heritage, and causing the classical forms of music indigenous to Asia to peter out. But Khan has more faith in the next generation.

"Those who are educated in music study classical music, and they are informed and entertained by it. When I look at my audiences, I see youth represented in full force. Classical music dates back centuries, it's not something that will just die. The interest in it will always be there. When I was young, MTV was popular, and of course, we listened to American pop. But that never caused my interest in our music to wane," he says.

"The mind welcomes other forms, but it doesn't shut out one form to make room for a new one. My uncle left many legacies, but the way he put qawwali into the minds of the young is, perhaps, his most enduring."

Khan played Hong Kong in March last year. The Convention Centre show was sold out and the 3,000-strong crowd gave him five standing ovations. Says Anita Garg, one of the organisers of the event: "We've never seen such a reaction from the local community. When he sung a cappella, there was complete silence, and by the finale, the crowd was on its feet."

"Sometimes my shows blend into one another, but I can remember being deeply touched by the Hong Kong audience," says Khan. "They offered me such warmth and love. I'm keen to repay them for that by playing some new arrangements of songs, along with my latest numbers."

When asked if there is any music he dislikes, he demurs. "To me, there is no bad music. All music is merely notes, neither good nor bad," he says. "If it is bad, it is not music."

Rahat Fateh Ali Khan Live in Concert
Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, Wan Chai,
October 8, 2013, 8pm,
HK$300-HK$2,000
HK Ticketing. Inquiries: 6019 0621

HK Ticketing

Mohit Chauhan: Voice of the valleys

PERHAPS IT WAS his time spent in the Indian city of Dharamshala, where the exiled Dalai Lama and thousands of his Tibetan followers have set up monasteries and temples, that brought a hint of spirituality to Mohit Chauhan’s mellifluous voice.

It’s a voice that has been heard in many Bollywood films, and one that will be heard in Hong Kong when Chauhan performs a one-off concert on May 10, coming after he won practically every award possible for his playback singing (recording songs for soundtracks that are lipsynched by actors in the actual film) in the 2011 film Rockstar.

However, it isn’t the rock anthems that have won him the accolades, it is the spiritual sufi (mystical) numbers that climbed the charts and struck a chord with music lovers throughout the Indian subcontinent.

“Like Rahman [the Oscar-winning A.R. Rahman, who composed the songs in Rockstar], I love singing spiritual songs, something that has meaning, a lyrical soul,” the singer says from his home in Mumbai. “I started singing for him just a few years ago and we gelled on those songs. He gives such freedom to his singers – which is why musicians love him. And I love singing his numbers as you can let go and sing your heart out on stage.”

The man seen on stage in his younger days bears little resemblance to the confident star in a black hat and leather jacket who appears under the spotlights today. Chauhan confesses that he did a bit of theatre while studying and sang a bit during his mullet-haired, rock T-shirt-wearing days at college, but nothing too serious.

He and a close group of friends would perform in whatever venues they could find around Dharamsala, singing and strumming along as their voices would reverberate around the valleys.
It paid off well. Chauhan’s range is indeed as wide as those hills, and his vast repertoire encompasses everything from classical, pop and fusion, along with the romantic ballads that are Bollywood staples. The soft-spoken singer confesses that unlike many of his contemporaries, he was entirely self-taught.
“Fortunately – or unfortunately – I had no formal training in music,” he says. “But it’s always been a part of me. I have always sung for myself. It never occurred to me to become a professional musician. I studied science and did my masters in geology. I wanted to join the civil service or the Indian army – I even trained for that – but not for singing on stage.”

He may be selling out concert halls these days, but for many years he often faced empty auditoriums where he and his posse rehearsed. “Our criteria was how good the sound was – it had to have a hint of echo – and we’d play anywhere. There weren’t many, if any, professional places where we could sing. I come from a beautiful, small state where it’s all about nature. We had no money, maybe just enough to pay the rent, but when you’re stringing along with your bros, that’s freedom,” he says.
These days, Chauhan is too busy to sing with many of the other performers he admires. “I love to sing with others – but most of my duets are recorded separately, and often in separate places. Everything is brought together by technology. So when I hit the stage with another female singer, for example, sometimes it’s the first time I have met them in person,” he says with a laugh.

While he is well aware that he has a loyal following among the young indie-Hindi-pop crowd, Chauhan himself prefers to listen to singers from the 1960s and ‘70s. “As any Indian male singer will tell you, the love we have for Kishore Kumar [the iconic playback singer who died in 1987] borders on worship. The man had unbelievable range – he did soft numbers, rock, anthems; he acted, he produced … he rocked the stage.”

And this is perhaps what the next generation will be saying about Chauhan in years to come.

Mohit Chauhan, May 10, 7.30pm, Kitec, 1Trademart Drive, Kowloon Bay, HK$288- HK$1,500, HK Ticketing. Inquiries: 3128 8288

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