Marie and Rosetta at @sohoplace: Beverley Knight and Ntombizodwa Ndlovu give stunning vocal performances

Ntombizodwa Ndlovu (Marie Knight) and Beverley Knight (Sister Rosetta Tharpe) - (Johan Persson)

She sang gospel at the Cotton Club, influenced Elvis’s hip-shaking performance style and Jimi Hendrix’s guitar-playing, and possibly had an affair with her female protégé. The neglected story of musical pioneer Sister Rosetta Tharpe is ripe for retelling. But the strength of this bio-drama lies in the stunning vocal performances of the great Beverley Knight and newcomer Ntombizodwa Ndlovu, rather than in George Brant’s pedestrian script.

Monique Touko’s stripped-back co-production — seen at Chichester and Kingston last year and on tour with ETT — has a gutsy energy and has been neatly repurposed for this in-the-round West End venue. Soul legend Knight, as usual, is better than the material she’s been given, and she is matched here in passion and power by Ndlovu as Marie Knight, who was plucked by Rosetta from her rival Mahalia Jackson’s support act and turned into a touring partner.