Naturally 7 at Miner Auditorium

Naturally 7
Miner Auditorium
San Francisco, CA
August 10, 2025

Seven voices filled Miner Auditorium with the weight and punch of a full band—no guitars, no drum kit, no horns in sight. It was a packed house, and from the opening moments, the crowd responded to each reveal with whoops and standing applause. One woman punctuated multiple song intros with an emphatic "Yes! Yes!"—a fair summary of the room's mood all night.

Naturally 7 calls its approach "Vocal Play," a point musical director Roger Thomas clarified early: A cappella means singing without instruments; Vocal Play means becoming the instruments. "People were getting confused," he said, explaining why the group coined the term and wrote "Wall of Sound." The distinction matters because what followed was not just harmony singing—it was orchestration.

The show's architecture underscored that idea. Two one-hour sets framed a 15-minute intermission, with a state-of-the-art video screen hovering above and behind the group. The screen expanded the stage picture—clips from past TV appearances, animations and moody textures—adding to the stories in each song. Miner's lighting is brisk and modern, tuned to the space's clean acoustic and intimate sightlines.

They opened with "Pure Imagination," entering one by one from the shadows as an animation glowed overhead. The arrangement functioned like an audio thesis: Ricky Cort's first-tenor lead floated over N'namdi Bryant's subsonic bass lines, which read as electric bass rather than low-voiced doo-wop. Warren Thomas supplied the vocal drum kit and hand percussion with startling attack, while Roderick Eldridge quietly armed a loop pedal—clicks and claps captured, stacked, and released as a pulse bed. By "Follow the Leader" and "Wall of Sound," the illusion had become a habit: your ears drew a kick drum and hi-hat where there were only mouths and breath.

Set 1 combined originals and reworks. The gospel-tinged "Going Home" swelled on block chords and a patient, church-bred rubato. "Same Train" showed the group's arranging sense. "Ready or Not" tightened the rhythmic screws, Eldridge flicking turntable scratches in the pocket. Then came the coup de théâtre: "Lo's & High's/Somewhere Over the Rainbow" resolving into "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." The screen flashed rotating portraits of the singers, then a gentle rain motif that mirrored the arrangement's drip-to-downpour build. Cort mimed a guitar lead—complete with whammy-bar swoops—while shaping the tone with hard consonants and open vowels; the result was oddly tactile, like hearing fingers tug at nickel strings. Deep bass thumps, crisp snare pops, and a sparkling "cymbal" wash framed the solo, and the audience erupted appreciatively as the set closed.

Thomas spent time as an emcee without slowing momentum. He introduced the singers, spotlighted each voice, and explained the stage picture: tenors massed stage right, baritone colors to the left, Bryant centered upstage on a riser. He also tested the hall's demographics—by show of hands, many attending had never seen Naturally 7 live—then winked as if to say, "You'll leave believers."

Set 2 opened with "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," pulled forward by pulse rather than bombast. "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," a tribute to the late Roberta Flack, leaned into transparent harmony; Bryant's sustained low fundamentals were just loud enough to be felt more than heard. "Crazy" and "Englishman in New York" brought tone-painting: a brushed-snare illusion here, a clarinet-like reed color there (Warren Thomas, rendering the bite and breath of a single-reed line with uncanny accuracy). The audio mix deserved its own ovation—Miner's engineers kept the veil thin, balancing six solo mics and a loop channel so the timbres sat like a band, not a collage.

The evening's deep cut was a Simon & Garfunkel suite: "The Sound of Silence/Scarborough Fair Canticle/April Come She Will." Thomas framed it with a story from the group's 1999 Harmony Sweepstakes days. They had only one song fully road-ready, he said, so they built a ten-minute medley—and the judges, surprised to hear Simon & Garfunkel from a Black vocal group outfitted in head-to-toe black leather, declared them the winners. The performance here validated the anecdote. "Sound of Silence" arrived hushed, almost whispered, before a modal "Scarborough Fair" unfurled in canonic entrances. Eldridge's loop pedal locked a finger-picked pattern, and the lush "April Come She Will" coda felt weighted with breath, not nostalgia.

If the evening had a thesis statement beyond "Vocal Play," it was the idea that repertoire choice can reframe memory. That came through sharply in "It's Like That/Mama Said," where hip-hop insistence met Motown wisdom, and in the set closer "Get Up, Stand Up." Thomas prefaced the Bob Marley anthem by saying he did not want to get political but felt the song was right for the moment. The house stood, arms waving; a few audience members mirrored the onstage raised-fist gesture. Call-and-response bloomed into a chant, unified but never hectoring.

An encore of two crowd-pleasers sealed the rapport. "Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2" turned the famous hook into a choral stomp without losing bite. Then Coldplay's "Fix You" brought the room down gently, a slow-build arrangement that favored long lines over pyrotechnics. The melody landed in unison before opening into stacked thirds and sixths, the kind of close harmony that tells you the pitch center is safe in their hands. For many, it was the night's emotional crest.

Post-show, an announcement invited fans to the lobby for CD signings. The line formed quickly and applauded the band's lobby entrance. A couple celebrating their seventh anniversary compared notes on which of the seven signatures they were missing and beamed when the last name hit the booklet. It felt apt: a group built on togetherness, sending people home with a souvenir of it.

For those who still equate "a cappella" with collegiate skits, this concert was a quiet correction. Roger Thomas' baritone anchored the narrative, Warren Thomas supplied groove and color, Eldridge's loop craft expanded form, Cort's lead brought rock-and-soul edge, Sean Simmonds added burnished tenor weight, and Bryant's bass completed the illusion of a rhythm section. The blend was never sterile; breath noise, consonant clicks and vowel shade acted as legitimate musicianship, not gimmickry.

SFJAZZ's Miner Auditorium proved an ideal partner—stunning, modern, and intimate, with a sound system capable of revealing the subtle air in a held chord and the thud in Bryant's floor-tom-like hits. The large video screen, used sparingly and smartly, gave context (a brief clip from the group's 2008 appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show) and mood without stealing focus.

By the end, that early "Yes! Yes!" had become a room-wide verdict. Naturally 7 does not reject instruments so much as ask what the human voice can replace—and then answers, with care and flair; nearly everything. For longtime fans, the night affirmed the group's range. For newcomers, it offered an up-close-and-personal entry point into an art that treats harmony as both engine and destination. If you are curious, start with "Wall of Sound," then chase the live experience the next time Naturally 7 or SFJAZZ posts a date. This music rewards a closer look.

Set 1: "Pure Imagination," Follow the Leader," "Wall of Sound," "Going Home," "Same Train," "Ready or Not," "Lo's & High's/Somewhere Over The Rainbow," "While My Guitar Gently Weeps."

Set 2: "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," "Crazy," "Englishman in New York," "Say You Love Me," "It's Like That / Mama Said," The Sound of Silence/Scarborough Fair Canticle/April Come She Will "Get Up, Stand Up."

Encore: "Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2," "Fix You."

Comments