That hoary showbiz wheeze about getting to the fabled Carnegie Hall says that you have to "practise, practise, practise" before you can hit the stage. But for Antony Hegarty, getting to 57th Street involved a few trips to Europe.
A roundabout route to be sure (especially since the N, Q, R and W subway lines conveniently stop right outside), but there's nothing ordinary about how Antony & The Johnsons are swapping life as downtown alt.cabaret mainstays for swanky uptown performances.
It's been a smashing year in Europe for the Chichester-born chap with the Donegal roots who grew up in California. His forthcoming tour (which includes a Dublin show at Vicar St on November 25th) is already sold out, and the current album, I Am a Bird Now, has sold more than 150,000 copies since March. Sales rose 867.6 per cent in the week after Hegarty won the Mercury Music Prize in September. It seems that Europe just adores what Antony & his Johnsons are doing.
But no one expects a repeat performance in the United States. Over here, it's a different ball game and the chances of radio and retail, for instance, combining to make I Am a Bird Now a big hitter are highly unlikely.
As it is, Hegarty's successful exploits across the Atlantic have come as a huge surprise to many New York music business observers. To them, he will always be the guy from sleazy Lower East Side punk cabaret joints making awkward, experimental theatre.
Along the way, though, as Hegarty has played more conventional shows at venues like Joe's Pub, he has found an audience for his brittle, dramatic torch songs and passionate champions in Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson. A small audience, maybe, compared to other cult acts, but one which has grown to the extent that he can now fill almost every seat in Carnegie Hall.
No doubt many New Yorkers want to hear what all the fuss is about in the wake of the Mercury win. There are probably some here, too, who are curious to check out the venue that Scottish steel magnate Andrew Carnegie's two million dollars built back in 1891, a hall which doesn't usually feature acts of this nature.
What we hear is a voice which seems to have come from another planet. As the Johnsons produce a sound which swoops and swoons with delicate subtlety, Antony sings his sings about sadness, hopes, confusions and dreams. It's both remarkable and intense.
Such intensity only increases when Hegarty generously cedes the stage mid- show to Jimmy Scott. When the idea of the show was first broached, Hegarty explains to the audience, he immediately decided to invite Scott to perform, as a singer he has long been compared to and someone he obviously admires.
Had events worked out differently, Scott might well have been a Carnegie Hall regular instead of one of the most overlooked singers of all time. These days, this frail, delicate 80-year-old makes his living singing to audiences eating their steak suppers at stiff, stilted New York jazz clubs.
But tonight when Scott sings Why Was I Born and Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child with that giant heartbreaker of a voice reaching every nook and cranny, you can hear a pin drop in the room. It's sad to realise that it will only be in years to come, when Scott is long gone, that we'll recognise just what a treasure we ignored.
It's not the only guest spot on this big night out. Lou Reed comes onstage at the very end to play guitar as Hegarty sings Candy Says. When Reed toured in 2003, Hegarty was onstage to sing this song every night, so it's time to return the favour. Over Reed's chiming guitar, Hegarty sings his heart out about Warhol scene drag queen Candy Darling. A perfect end to Antony's perfect day.
