Nana News form music.guardian.co.uk
Bridgewater Hall, Manchester
Friday November 2, 2007
The Guardian
Perhaps if Nana Mouskouri had been starting out today there would be merchandising stalls selling copies of her trademark glasses. It certainly seems like a missed marketing opportunity when the world's most famous spectacle wearer opens with Amazing Grace - "Was blind, but now I see" - and does not dedicate it to her optician.
However, Mouskouri has no need of such modern nonsense. Her soaring voice has shifted 350m records, making her the most successful female singer ever. At 73, her farewell tour visits so many countries she presumably wants to thank each record-buyer personally. With hair still centre-parted like a 1960s student, she doesn't look her age and only sounds it when her once powerful range seems like it has been wedged into a straitjacket. Her Greek music clapalongs sound like a rowdy Mediterranean restaurant.