I understand the dramatic logic of that, but feel that they could start letting go somewhat earlier. Licked into last-minute shape by "artistic advisers" Murray Melvin and Syd Ralph, the show is as daft as all hell, as camp as Carmen Miranda's headdress, and tacky above and beyond the call of duty. But it's hard to resist a show where the wondrous Nichola McAuliffe, letting rip with a power-vibrato that a road-drill would envy, gets to play a musical cross between a Tennessee Williams heroine and Margarita Pracatan. Her role is that of Edwina, the newly widowed spouse of a rum tycoon. As her dysfunctional family gathers at a Puerto Rican mansion for the reading of the will, and to ponder Edwina's subsequent mysterious disappearance, secrets - teenage abortions, hidden homosexual leanings - start to tumble out of the closet. One is that the camp outrageousness can't build up a real head of steam because it keeps being interrupted by straight-faced, soul-searching numbers. Mocking the butch paternal ideal that has repressed the family (and which forced Edwina to doff her crown as the queen of song, and also warped the kids), it sets off a flurry of mutual blackmail.There are two basic problems.

Murderous Instincts is to raw machismo what Ernest Hemingway was to flower-arranging. Another (Michael Rooney, son of Mickey) gave a delicious new twist to the old gag about directors "phoning in a production" when, with his application for an emergency work permit blocked, he actually tried to oversee the show from Paris. Could Murderous Instincts possibly be as entertaining on stage as it has been off? Well, the answer is: at times, damn nearly. Reading reports of the strife-ridden run-up to this London opening, I began to feel that Murderous Instincts should be renamed Suicidal Tendencies. If ever a show looked as though it would be dancing into an early, self-excavated, grave out of town, it was this "salsa comedy murder mystery".

Written by Cinda Fox, heiress of the Firestone rubber company fortune, and produced by her spouse, Manny, the show has managed to get through more directors than Elizabeth Taylor has had husbands. One (Bob Carlton) was bawled out by Manny in front of the audience during the interval of a Norwich try-out. Comic legend Sir Norman Wisdom has finally announced that he is planning to retire - at the age of 90. Elsewhere, "My Aphrodisiac Is You" rewrites "I Get A Kick Out Of You" when neither the same sexiness or vigour.The big cheer for her forgettable big hit "Closest Thing To Crazy" notwithstanding, however, only closing versions of "I Put a Spell On You" and Eva Cassidy's "The Anniversary Song" hint at her potential And even then, they still trade unashamedly on the past.. It's for a far more sophisticated palate than that.No matter how much spin is afforded the girl and her music, however, there's one thing that no amount of carefully controlled styling will ever win her - a sense of history. Like many other contemporary female singers trading on a nebulous combination of image and undeniable ability as a singer, Melua patrols the periphery between the worlds of jazz and soul, with a little blues thrown in for good measure.While Melua has her own history, then, being born in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, raised in Belfast and then England, she is, in essence, just a white kid singing the blues.Which is not in any way meant to diminish her own talent, but it often seems that the hard-worn effect her songs strive for is beyond her. Advertising is a wonderful thing, or at least it is if you're Katie Melua.

Even those who happen to be unaware of her limited canon of work thus far will probably be able to form a fairly accurate impression of what her music is all about with just a glance at some of her elegant press shots, or one of her reservedly sedate videos. For everything that Melua puts her face or, indeed, that silky-smooth voice to is perfumed with a sense of class and dignity, the upshot being that this is not pop music. Saheba Davlatshaeva's Badakshan lament exuded a coiled intensity that gripped the heart: the pitch-range was so tight it seemed almost on one note, but the deli- cate melismas wound round the line-endings opened like flowers.Her partner Aqnazar Alavatov's tone in a Sufi poem was extraordinary, at once rock-hard and plangently expressive. The Shash Maqam singers from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan delivered their perfumed court music as though expiring in holy awe. And the instruments were a story in themselves: from the simple gijak fiddle to the intricate Afghan rubab, and the jew's harp made of wood.Despite the haste with which it had to be assembled, this was a flawless concert, whose drama was deepened by Michel Jaffrenou's deliciously witty light-paintings. And it was good to see the Aga Khan beaming down from the dress circle, since the fact that these musicians are now able to perform, teach, and travel is thanks to the academies he's created in those poverty-stricken Stans..