Folds charms home-town fans

DANIELLE O'DONOHUE

September 30, 2006 12:15am

IT DIDN'T take Adelaide's favourite adopted son, Ben Folds long to launch into his ode to the City of Churches, the simply titled "Adelaide".

Appropriately for the Festival Theatre concert, where Folds was backed by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, that song was one of the most dynamic in a night where rock and pop tunes took on a whole new dimension.

Backed by the 80-plus members of the ASO, which was conducted by Guy Noble, Folds' lyrical and witty pop songs became cinematic soundtracks, jazzy piano bar numbers and old musical hall-sounding classics thanks to the addition of strings, percussion, a brass section and even a harp.

Kicking things off with the uptempo "Zak and Sara", Folds mixed a night of songs with stories about the origins of many of his ditties. He named Norwood, Hindmarsh and North Adelaide as the birthplace of many of his musical creations.

The sold-out audience even got to join in - with Folds doing some conducting of his own to lead the crowd in a mass choir session.

And despite the auspicious occasion, Folds still looked every inch the rocker in his brown flared cords, t-shirt and sneakers.

It took a while for the audience to get vocal but when Folds started dropping local references the crowd got into the spirit of the night.

"You've got a lot of people who've never been to the orchestra before," Folds said before the show.

"Some nights they (the audience) have been slightly confused. Other nights they've decided on the first note that they're going to yell, like `let's see your tits' to the violin player."

Folds said he gets little time during the show to fully appreciate the musicians he's sharing the stage with.

"I'm pedalling ferociously beneath it all," he said.

"I'm really working hard to stay in time with bands that don't exist in metrical time. They exist in their own time. It's good time but it's different.

"When something comes up that they dig, when a moment blossoms, they just sit in it for an extra couple of seconds and meanwhile I'm onto the next bar. When they're liking their sound they just slow down."

Folds, who splits his time between his home in Adelaide and Nashville in the States is also about to release a new album, the eccentrically titled, supersunnyspeedgraphic, the LP of which contains a version of his ode to his adopted home.

Folds plays another sold-out concert at the Festival Theatre tonight.