Evoking something between Itzhak Perlman and Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull, Chicago-based singer/songwriter/violinist Andrew Bird took the stage on Sunday night clad in a scarf, a tattered suit coat and no shoes. He opened the set with a delicate pizzicato riff on his violin. Suddenly there were harmonies descending from all directions, and after a moment’s disorientation, it became clear that all the harmonies were coming from Bird. He was looping himself playing in layers, effectively turning his one violin into an entire string orchestra.
Andrew Bird continued to astound throughout the performance with his virtuosic fiddling, uncanny whistling ability, impressive vocal range and even his guitar playing. What’s more, he often did all of these things at once, frequently switching instruments several times during the course of a single song. Almost as impressive as Andrew Bird himself, astoundingly, was his band. The three-piece backing combo kept right up with their gypsy-genius of a ring leader, locking into Bird’s folk-inflected orchestral sweeps with exacting precision and plenty of rock sensibility.
Though he drew primarily from material off his most recent album Noble Beast, Bird threw in some old favorites for good measure, notably “Opposite Day,” “Scythian Empire” and “Fake Palindromes.” Every song was excellent, and the show was enrapturing from top to bottom. A gifted singer, songwriter, instrumentalist and performer, Andrew Bird managed to blow the audience’s collective mind in just a little over 90 minutes.
