A HEREFORD trio is taking their cabaret production, Alive and Brel, further afield, performing in both Bristol and Cheltenham in the New Year.

Local singers Tim Brown, Alison Allan and Steve Allan first brought their revue of songs by the legendary Belgian singer-songwriter, Jacques Brel, to the Three Choirs Festival in Hereford in 2012 and repeated their production at the Festival in Gloucester the following year.

Since then Alive and Brel has given sold out performances to the Hereford Cathedral School PTA, the Little Princess Trust and the Hereford Musical Theatre Company, respectively, as well as featuring in a French evening for the Hereford Rotary Club. Tim, Steve and Ali took the show to the Alma Tavern and Theatre in Bristol in the summer, in a performance which Stage Talk Magazine called ‘a surprise package’, praising the ‘blending of the three voices, more than capable of presenting Brel’s songs.’

Accompanied by Jon Weller on the piano and Esther Kay on flute, Alive and Brel will be returning to the Alma on January as well as doing two nights at the Cheltenham Everyman Studio Theatre on January 29 and 30. Alive and Brel will then be returning to The Courtyard Studio Theatre for a cabaret performance on May 6.

Brel’s music is famed for its emotional power and ironic wit. The songs are laced with dark and passionate observations which paint a tableau of imperfect humanity and have been recorded by international stars as diverse as Dusty Springfield, Frank Sinatra, David Bowie and Marc Almond.