In case it is useful to anyone, this is the workaround I am using.
x=0:10; y=rand(size(x));
C=colormap;
c=interp1((0:size(C,1)-1)/(size(C,1)-1),C,x./max(x));
figure(1)
barr(x,y,c);
with the function
function barr(x,y,c)
for count=1:max(size(x))
X=ones(size(x))*NaN;
Y=X;
X(count)=x(count);
Y(count)=y(count);
bar(X,Y,'FaceColor',c(count,:))
if count ==1; hold on; end
end
hold off
end
