Stevie Wonder in Dublin: A few hours with a musical genius

Stevie Wonder: Songs In The Key Of Life 50th Anniversary Tour3Arena, Dublin★★★★☆When Paul Simon stepped up to receive the 1976 Grammy for album of the year, he nodded to various collaborators before adding, “And most of all, I’d like to thank Stevie Wonder, who didn’t make an album this year.” Wonder, who dominated the Grammys during the early 1970s, had won the same award the previous two years. He was back on the podium again a year later for another masterpiece, Songs in the Key of Life.Music was spilling out of Wonder back then, so much so that the double album came with an additional four-song EP, and every note remains godlike. No surprise, then, that 3Arena was, despite sky-high ticket prices, sold out as Wonder presented the album in its entirety. Spending a few hours with a musical genius is a priceless experience.READ MOREAfter a spoken introduction asking everyone to close their eyes to see the world as he does, and some slight wavering as his 76-year old voice settled in, he led a band that made the RTÉ Concert Orchestra look understaffed through the album’s twists and turns. It’s probably easier, given the musical chops on display, to secure Mensa membership than a place in Wonder’s troupe. One of the percussionists – there were three, along with two guitarists, full horn and string sections, and a phalanx of backing singers – displayed virtuosity armed only with a tambourine and triangle.The early highlight was probably Wonder’s pipes opening up fully for Sir Duke, with its spectacular brass breakdown, before bassist Nathan Watts, who played on the original record, took us into a joyous I Wish. But then again, with an album this vast, there were several “ah, I’d forgotten this one” moments, such as the rush of hearing the melody of Knocks Me Off My Feet before combined string and brass drove it towards that glorious key change, or the horns and melodica gathered around Wonder’s chromatic harmonica for the instrumental Easy Goin’ Evening which showed that some of his interludes beat other artists’ best efforts.It was a night full of incredible moments. Not least when Wonder’s harmonica slipped into Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean, the stately Joy Inside My Tears finished with an unexpected violin solo, and harpist Brandee Younger stepped up to accompany Stevie on If It’s Magic, which it very much was.And then the man himself knocked a solo out of a harpejji (a tiny cross between a piano and a guitar) with such casual melodic brilliance one suspects he could get a tune out of a forklift if he had to. Kudos too to the sound engineers who made every note of this soulful symphony clearly audible whether it was a blasting horn or a strummed guitar.There was no flagging towards the end either. A fantastic As prompted some of Wonder’s best singing and even after he’d finished with the album, he didn’t seem interested in heading home. Instead, he joked about running over time as he closed with both Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours and Superstition.He seemed to be enjoying himself immensely too, whether he was declaring his love, giving out a singing lesson (“you’re a little out of key, we’ll do it again”), or muttering about some possible Irish blood in his background. We won’t experience his like again.