The globe-trotting singer, actress, and cabaret performer Pinky Steede came home to sing at the Bermuda Music Festival and wowed the large crowd with a sophisticated set of classic songs.

She was backed by her 'Little Big Band', Toni Bari leading from the keyboard, Ronnie Lopes and Stan Gilbert on drums and bass, and reedman Max Maybury with trumpeter Derek Hamlin completing the line up.

"I Love Being Here With You" was aptly chosen as it became more and more evident that Ms Steede was loving every moment on stage. Dressed in a smart blue suit of short jacket and pants she moved with energy and grace putting all of her svelte frame into every song she sang.

"Let's fall in Love", sung down tempo, Burt Bacharach's "The Look of Love", (somewhat low for her voice, I thought), and samba-styled "Love For Sale" followed. It was all very mellow. She had her challenges; the wind, for one thing and a somewhat too busy piano, for another.

There were two especially wonderful moments for me; the first was when Ms Steede invited the talented Ronnie Lopes to sing, in his "native" language, Portuguese, the duet with her, "Girl from Panama".

Ms Steede herself will have more than a passing acquaintance with that language having resided in Portugal these last ten years.

The other was when a voice from the audience yelled out "Mama!"

"That's my Baby. Crystal." So, cabaret star, actress, singer, and Mama. Grandmother too. She could be the poster girl for grandmotherhood. As she herself said: "I'm still here. And still got it. Because you want me to have it."

Max Maybury's solo on "Fly Me to the Moon" was memorable, as was Pinky's Billie Holiday-like inflection.

I felt there might have been greater variety in the choice of tempo, as the great majority of songs were in a mellow groove. For example the last thing we heard was "S'Wonderful", in the same tempo.

Then all too soon the set was over, before they had time for their planned finale.

She was gracious even in taking her leave, thanking her band, and expressing gratitude to the Government for having her play here, at home.

Keiko Matsui was the other lady on stage that evening. Her petite figure at the electronic keyboard gave no hint of the power and volume at her disposal.

She also had to contend with a strong wind as the weather by now was quite threatening. She began her set with one of her own compositions, the name of which I didn't quite hear, it employed a melody shadowed thirds by Michael Giger's soprano saxophone.

The sax man actually took the lion's share of improvisational duties throughout the set with some great solos to Matsui's accompaniment.

A number of her compositions were rhythmically playful, like the piece for Ka Pa, the elf, which employed 5/4 time.

Other pieces played with the metric duality implicit in compound time, so that one got the idea, common in African derived music, of moving between alternate ways of reckoning time.

Her husband Kazu came onstage to accompany her on a traditional Japanese flute.

When she moved to the acoustic piano her skill and touch became more evident.

I must confess that I found a lot of this music a challenge to listen to. There's no denying its appeal, as Matsui has recorded 15 albums and is billed as America's number one instrumentalist - and her music was loudly applauded by the large crowd.

Several acquaintances of mine with sound musical tastes shared with me their appreciation of this music. I guess I just didn't get it.

That was to be the end of the entertainment for the evening, for the rain that had been falling intermittently came back with unrelenting force and the organisers were force to postpone the rest of the event.