CLARE Teal and her Hollywood Style Orchestra, The Concorde, Eastleigh

IT is not often you see a 16 piece orchestra on the stage of Eastleigh’s Concorde Club.

But this was a mega tribute to blockbusting movie star Doris Day.

Jazz star Clare Teal has always championed the music of one of the most beloved female singers of the 20 th century.

Last year Clare celebrated the Hollywood screen goddess’s 90 th birthday on BBC Radio 2’s Friday Night Is Music Night.

There was such a phenomenal response that Clare decided to create a show that celebrated the whole of Doris’s life including her contribution to the world of music.

Now the popular Radio 2 presenter has taken this spectacular production on the road and it stopped off at the Stoneham Lane club where Clare carved out her own glittering career.

She describes her show as the “full Doris” and it certainly lives up to that billing, embracing the Hollywood legend’s massive show stopping hits and later material influenced by the world of pop.

Clare opened the first of her two sets with It’s Magic, one of the numbers from Doris Day’s film debut, Romance on the High Seas.

It was followed by the very up tempo Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps as she took the audience on a journey through the musical life of one of the biggest stars to come from Tinseltown.

Accompanying Clare on the star studded journey was a 16 piece band, made up of some of the finest musicians in the land.

They included saxophonist Ben Castle, son of the late Roy Castle , of TV’s Record Breakers fame and Gordon Campbell, lead trombone in the BBC Big Band.

Midway through the second set Clare was joined by award winning singer and special guest Matthew Ford, widely regarded as one of the finest big band singers in the United Kingdom.

Doris Day was also famous for her duets and Clare and Matthew joined forces for a very jolly version of No Two People from the 1952 Hans Christian Andersen film.

Matthew also delivered a beautiful version of Young At Heart from another musical film epic starring Doris Day and Frank Sinatra.

Other classics from the Doris Day song book included Secret Love, Deadwood Stage and Ready Willing and Able and the Black Hills of Dakota from the wild west themed classic Calamity Jane film.

Then it was time for a singalong as arms swayed and the chants of Que Sera Sera (Whatever Will Be Will Be) brought a rousing end to an evening of “full Doris.”

Duncan Eaton