Veronica Swift Tickets

Veronica Swift - Went to Jimmy's Jazz club Portsmouth, NH, expecting a Jazz concert, by a young musician who by all her reviews in Jazz publications was deemed excellent. Instead we got a Pat Benatar meets fusion punk rock - concert which if not bad enough and false advertising... The mix, by a sound engineer who was at best at a high school level, provided a concert in which the Drums over powered everyone onstage on every number in the entire concert 70% too loud, The keyboard, Guitar and Bass were 40% too loud, which then drowned out the lead singer on every song, so not really sure if she was good or not as you couldn't hear her. Total waste of time & money, truly disappointing!!

Ms. Swift and her band were excellent musicians, but we had good reason to think this would be a jazz concert. We were very disappointed when they started playing rock, which we have no interest in. The audience was plainly older, which should have been obvious, and, having talked by chance to someone else who was there, we know that we were not the only disappointed people in the audience.

Veronica and her band came to Portsmouth and blew the roof off the place ! Imagine seeing Bowie or Queen in a small club when they were just starting out - that's the energy level of this show. The old white haired crowd was not ready for the vocal hurricane that is Ms Swift and the musical diversions into "Punk Cabaret"(her words) really tested their resolve. But she won them over by the end and I for one cannot wait to see where her career takes her.

No doubt Veronica Swift is a top performer and extraordinary artist. Her band was exquisite. For a jazz club the setlist was too rock-heavy. I was prepared for this though. As a professional vocalist myself, I sadly felt forced to leave early because the mix was way too loud to a point where the vocalist was drowned out by the instruments. This is not the kind of venue that needs to do that. Sitting on a dining table is not the same as TD Gardens. I still give four stars as an acknowledgment for the artists.