I did not know what to expect. I was told that Boothby Graffoe and Antonio Forcionne, who opened at Daylesford Theatre on Monday, were a couple of stand up comedians. It was casually mentioned that one of them played the guitar.

Not particularly partial to standup, I envisioned standard jokes and a few badly sung parodies of popular music with run of the mill strumming. I thought that the songs might even be clever. After all it is the Bermuda Festival.

As soon as James Rogers, the Boothby Graffoe half of the duo, shouted in the dark off-stage, “And now introducing, me”, I knew it was going to be clever.

Immediately he connected with the audience by using very funny topical jokes. Starting with his arrival on the Island and encountering staff and performers at the airport he quickly built up an easy rapport and proved that he was a quick study.

Next he heckled latecomers and did a quick run recap for their benefit, word for word, of his beginning spiel to the delight of the audience.

As more latecomers straggled in, they were treated to the same hilarious singling out. Mr. Rogers ability to improvise astounded me. At this point I assumed that he would perform for half the evening and then Antonio would come out and do his bit. Rogers sat and began his first song and was joined mid-intro by Antonio. Immediately the contrasts between the two were evident.

James was tall and dressed in a leather jacket, plain white shirt and slightly tatty black pants with sneakers. Forcionne was immaculately attired, also in black, with a cap and designer shoes - the suave and cool Italian and obviously the straight man of the comedy act.

It became apparent during the performance of the song that Antonio was a virtuoso guitarist, adding texture, pinpoint nuance and believable pop sensibility to the number. Later in the evening during his instrumental solo he shed his straight man image with a beautiful and complexly funky performance of his own music.

He involved his whole body in the performance, creating percussion here, using silence there to punctuate hidden rhythms, using his face, eyes and limbs to interject moments of comedy.

At one point he transformed the guitar into a typewriter using the strings and mimed movement that was graceful and fluid. The man was literally dancing in his seat with members of the audience grooving along.

It was simply the best, most interesting live guitar performance I have had the pleasure of witnessing. I even purchased a CD at the end of the show, something I very rarely do and never do with instrumentalists unless there is also singing.

James touched on a variety of issues and themes for his humour, effortlessly switching from one to the other. Often he broke into little conversations with himself using different voices and accents to create characters that were distinct and hilarious.

At one point,he was having a conversation with his kitten and I had tears in my eyes. Three minutes later I was still laughing uncontrollably at the genius imaginary exchange.

The two worked really well together and their artistry significantly enhanced the humour. After the performance I read in the programme the impressive and acclaimed accomplishments of both and it was obvious just how much talent had gone into the creating the magic that seemed so organic and easy on stage.

I can not repeat any of the jokes or accurately convey the immense enjoyment that I experienced but I can truly say that I laughed, heartfelt, tearful belly laughs and left with a headache akin to a mild hangover, feeling a lot lighter for the intense unexpected release.