Edinburgh Fringe Music, Cabaret & Variety reviews: These Are the Contents of My Head (The Annie Lennox Show) | Solve Along A Murder She Wrote | Swingology: Ali Affleck, Dick Lee and the Swingaholics

A kaleidoscopic tribute to Annie Lennox from a fabulous drag queen kicks off our latest batch of Fringe music, cabaret and variety reviews. Words by Fiona Shepherd, Claire Smith and Jim Gilchrist

Salty Brine in These Are the Contents of My Head (The Annie Lennox Show) | Contributed

CABARET & VARIETY

These Are the Contents of My Head (The Annie Lennox Show) ★★★★

Assembly Checkpoint (Venue 322) until 25 August

New York drag queen Salty Brine has pulled in his Fringe audience under false pretences. Anyone expecting an Annie Lennox drag night had better prepare for an even more sophisticated offering. This Boston-born diva is curator of The Living Record Collection, a series of shows inspired by classic albums and literature.

These Are the Contents of My Head pairs Lennox’s 1992 debut solo album Diva with the ultimate diva Judy Garland, in particular her classic 1961 concert recording Judy at Carnegie Hall, already covered in its entirety by Rufus Wainwright. In a further twist, Salty intertwines tales from his own childhood with the plot of Kate Chopin’s classic 19th century novel The Awakening, an American Madame Bovary set in steamy New Orleans which follows the fortunes of proto-feminist Edna Pontellier.

That’s a lot of balls to juggle but Salty has a lot of balls; no-one would be surprised if he actually started juggling. While the audience may not always be sure of the artistic associations, Salty is in full control from grand feathered entrance looking like a self-styled “rare green booby”.

There are swinging lounge bar renditions of Lennox’s Why, the pairing of Walking on Broken Glass with That’s Entertainment! and Money Can’t Buy This with Puttin’ On the Ritz and a show-stopping duet with musical director Ben Langhorst, a man who can rock a feathered bonnet, singing Little Bird and Hello Bluebird in canon with sassy, brassy backing.

Along the fabulous way, Salty makes connections between Edna’s liberation and his own mother’s post-divorce awakening, giving it everything as a performer and leaving it all on the stage. If only all brazenly self-indulgent shows were carried off with such panache and commitment. Fiona Shepherd

We're offering 40% off an annual digital subscription to The Scotsman, so you can enjoy a summer of amazing content for less. Checkout using promo code SUMMER40. Subscribe at www.scotsman.com/subscriptions

CABARET & VARIETY

Solve Along A Murder She Wrote ★★★★

theSpace @ Symposium Hall (Venue 43) until 24 August

The Fringe, famously, has something for everyone. And this show is right up my street. You sit on big comfy chairs (not to be sniffed at in busy August) and watch a classic episode of the long-running detective drama Murder She Wrote. But there’s more.

Our host is Tim Benzie, an Australian superfan, who discusses the episode in real time, sharing biographical details about the actors and pointing out significant moments and recurring themes.

One of the most reassuring things about Murder She Wrote is that each episode has the same improbable plot. A middle-aged crime writer, in a luxury location, witnesses a murder, finds a clue, solves the crime. And ends on a laugh.

I should probably mention that Benzie is dressed as our heroine Jessica Fletcher – and mimes along to her dialogue in a pedestrian form of lip synching. But he, like us, has his eyes locked to the screen, watching the theatrical and televisual marvel who was Dame Angela Lansbury. (Did you know that her grandfather invented the Labour Party? That’s not in the show, I just thought I’d mention it.)

Benzie is a delightful, funny and charming host who invites us to guess the murderer as we go along, by waving little paddles decorated with a picture of Dame Angela as Jessica Fletcher. You can give them back after the show, which is lovely for the environment. But I’m definitely keeping mine. It will make me smile every time I look at it. Claire Smith

MUSIC

Swingology: Ali Affleck, Dick Lee and the Swingaholics ★★★★

Valvona & Crolla (Venue 67) until 22 August

Upstairs from the famous Italian deli, the accent becomes decidedly French as clarinettist Dick Lee – he of the rainbow braces – leads the Swingaholics in evoking the cafés and clubs of 1940s Paris and the inspired jazz that emanated from them. Lee, on clarinet and bass clarinet (the latter handily propped on a couple of cookery volumes from downstairs), is joined by the impeccably syncopated trio of double-bassist Owen Macdonald, lead guitarist Uri Stav and rhythm guitarist Ian McNally.

Vocalist Ali Affleck is, we are assured, doing “that Fringe thing” and is en route from another venue. In the meantime the band establish the swingy, good-humoured vibe with the Ellington classic, Take the A Train, bass thrumming through the intimate little venue, while Lee’s delivery includes cheeky quotations from Girl From Ipanema, In the Mood and others. They follow up with a Sydney Bechet blues, the clarinet sinuous and swooping with an echo of Bechet’s distinctive vibrato before Stav takes it off on guitar.

Veering from swing to bebop, a Charlie Parker tune has the place pulsing mightily, and so it goes, Django Reinhardt’s Swing 48 working up quite a head of steam until a slightly breathless Affleck arrives and launches into a popular 1930s standard, All of Me, the band pacing nicely alongside. She switches to French for another song associated with Reinhardt, Coucou, then into klezmer territory for Bei Mir Bistu Shein – “To Me You’re Lovely”, the group thrumming along at pace.

Even with a late vocalist, Swingology makes for a tightly performed and good-humoured show, and it winds up in characteristically snappy style with an encore of Stompin’ at Decca, that bass clarinet sounding fruity against crisp accompaniment. Jim Gilchrist