What was your last concert you went to ?

Saturday 18th Brighton Center:-
Aussie Pink Floyd, The Wall and greatest hits.

Bloody superb.Great Lights Good sound (a tadge too loud, ringing ears),although the lead voice was a bit back in the mix. With this sort of repertoire it's should be difficult to sound bad, but they made no attempt at being bad.

I saw James Morrison at the RAH at the end of March, a present for the missus He was pretty good to be fair

Hugh Masekela quintet (with Rene McLean, son of Jackie McLean sitting in on tenor sax for part of the performance) at Hartford's Artist's Collective last night. Not bad overall, but a little short on some of his more famous songs (I'm not too familiar with his work outside of his popular hits).

Just saw two nights of
The Dead at the DCU Centre in Worcester, Mass. Great shows, Sunday night was an unbelievable, unpredictable selection of good 'ole Grateful Dead tunes played well, tight and inspired. The sound system was superb.

Just back from Ultravox at the Brighton Dome. An excellent gig all the main titles only a couple I didn't know. Strangely this is the first synth band gig I've been to and when they all go onto keyboards, I found it very disconcerting not knowing who was play what. Much better when drums and guitars were used. Midge Ure still has a great voice and the ability to move in and out on the mike to regulate his volume, most singers seem to have the thing fully in their mouths all the time.

So gig score for April so far 3 out of 4 good.

I have always had a soft spot for beautiful French ladies so I was delighted last night when I was finally able to get to a concert from the French Pianist Helene Grimaud performing Brahms First Piano Concerto. Amazing how she can play that keyboard.

How on earth can those people play properly, when they haven't got evening dress on?????

quote:

Originally posted by BigH47:
How on earth can those people play properly, when they haven't got evening dress on?????

Photo is not from last nights show. They were all dressed a bit more prim and proper.

quote:

They were all dressed a bit more prim and proper.

That's a shame, they always look so bloody uncomfortable in their "monkey suits".

quote:

Originally posted by Wolf2:
Wagner's Walkure, 2nd of the Ring cycle, just ****ing amazing fantasy staged at LA Opera with Achim Freyer director. Colorful and wild. Incredible singing.

The production looks like good fun and appropriate for LA. The penny dropped for me half way through act 1 of Walkure five years ago with your man Domingo as Sigmund. Since then it's been a thoroughly enjoyable, if expensive*, journey via London, Berlin, Vienna, Weimar, and New York (...and Manchester next week). Be warned, this can be addictive stuff!

duncan

*just bought tickets for this summer's Mariinsky Ring in London.

Mathias Eick Quartet - When I go to see show like this, it makes me wonder why I bother going to some of the big gigs (Jackson Browne for instance).

This was a truly simple and memorable night with musicianship of the highest order in a tiny hall in Oxford and a 12 quid ticket.

Whilst I would love more people to know and like this kind of music, one of the advantages of it not being better known is that you get up close to the musicians in a very intimate setting.

I thoroughly enjoyed this as did Mrs Lontano. So good think I might catch him again, Tuesday night at the Vortex.

Just back from Joe Bonamassa at RAH. Sally and I enjoyed it at least. Unfortunately after seeing him last year at an 800ish seater, this 4600 venue strained him a bit and he tried "stadium mode". A couple of guests , Paul Jones and Eric Clapton on stage, and Mike Rutherford and Jackie Stewart spotted in the audience.
A good 8/10 from the Crawley jury, less from further south I'm guessing.

Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (Bramwell Tovey)

Debussy, Rachmaninoff (Avan Yu, Piano) and Stravinsky.

quote:

Originally posted by BigH47:
Just back from Joe Bonamassa at RAH. Sally and I enjoyed it at least. Unfortunately after seeing him last year at an 800ish seater, this 4600 venue strained him a bit and he tried "stadium mode". A couple of guests , Paul Jones and Eric Clapton on stage, and Mike Rutherford and Jackie Stewart spotted in the audience.
A good 8/10 from the Crawley jury, less from further south I'm guessing.

Howard - thanks for organising. Yes, it was a bit stadium. For me very mixed some good things when he got bluesy and some a little cringe worthy when stadium. He obviously enjoyed hmself proclaiming it the best night of his life. Eric Clapton is god.

Bob Dylan at the SECC, Glasgow last Saturday. On the face of it, a combination of the worst venue in the world, crappy seats, and a voice even more like sand and glue than it was 40 years ago doesn't sound very promising but somehow it all turned out superbly well. He ignored everything between 1967 and 1990 so unfortunately there was nothing from Blood on the Tracks, but the newer songs generally sounded excellent. I was glad I'd been able to listen to downloads of a few of his recent gigs because some of the new arrangements took a bit of getting into. Well worth a visit.

Muzikcentrum Fritz Philips, Eindhoven.

Academy of Ancient Music - conductor and Klavecimbel Richard Egarr
7 violins, 1 double Bass, 1 cello, 1 bassoon, 2 obes, 2 horns and the Klavecimbel ( actually a fortepiano )

Haydn Symphonie no 59 'Feuersymphonie'
Haydn Cello concerto in C with soloist Pieter Wispelway on Cello added
Haydn Klavecimbel concerto no 31
Haydn Symphony no 26 "Lamentatione'

In a hall with marvellous acoustics. Ensemble passages sounded as though a full orchestra was there.No room for error and none made. Beautifully played throughout. Great evening.

Geoff

Bob Dylan at the O2 in Dublin last night. Unfortunately, the sound was appalling,which completely ruined the event for me. If they made a CD of what I heard from my seating position, nobody would buy it. This is a pity because he sang 'If you ever go to Houston' for the first time on stage (I think). Do these guys never listen to what they sound like from the punters' point of view? And why do we punters put up with it?

quote:

Originally posted by David O'Higgins:
Bob Dylan at the O2 in Dublin last night. Unfortunately, the sound was appalling,which completely ruined the event for me. If they made a CD of what I heard from my seating position, nobody would buy it. This is a pity because he sang 'If you ever go to Houston' for the first time on stage (I think). Do these guys never listen to what they sound like from the punters' point of view? And why do we punters put up with it?

And apparently the O2 was going to eradicate all the Point's sonic deficiencies. Just a prettier big barn then?


SJB

I wouldn't judge the venue on what I heard yesterday. Presumably Dylan's people are responsible for the electronic setup which produced such dreadful sounds. I suspect that with a more enlightened production it might produce the goods, but who is going to let that happen?
The sad thing is that many people have been reared on this kind of distortion fest and they don't know how much better it could be.

quote:

Originally posted by David O'Higgins:
I wouldn't judge the venue on what I heard yesterday. Presumably Dylan's people are responsible for the electronic setup which produced such dreadful sounds.

The sad thing is that many people have been reared on this kind of distortion fest and they don't know how much better it could be.

But surely the techs haven't?
Even when you moan to the group , as I did re the Wembley sound for the R30 Rush tour , they do not not even acknowledge your contact.

I can't see a "ban" by annoyed fans helping it will only allow for more tickets to be sold to those who don't care, or go the venue for a chat or see how many drinks they can consume during the performance.

Howard

I can understand that a particular venue may have "bad acoustics" so it's always difficult or impossible to get a decent sound, but when the same venue can sound either brilliant or awful depending on the band there's a real problem. I saw the Stones in Green's Playhouse in Glasgow in 1973 and the sound was absolutely atrocious - nothing but a wall of noise and feedback. By that time I'd already seen quite a few bands there (including the Stones themselves in 1971) and the sound had often been as near perfect as you could get back then. But that night it was abysmal. I don't think there's any excuse for it, particularly with somebody like Dylan or the Stones.

Thankfully the sound in the SECC last Saturday was excellent, much to my surprise as it's notorious for its poor acoustics (or perhaps lazy sound engineers use that as an excuse).

Wispelwey... A great cello voice !!

Must have been a marvellous evening

cheers
Stefan

quote:

Originally posted by Geoff P:
Muzikcentrum Fritz Philips, Eindhoven.

Academy of Ancient Music - conductor and Klavecimbel Richard Egarr
7 violins, 1 double Bass, 1 cello, 1 bassoon, 2 obes, 2 horns and the Klavecimbel ( actually a fortepiano )

Haydn Symphonie no 59 'Feuersymphonie'
Haydn Cello concerto in C with soloist Pieter Wispelway on Cello added
Haydn Klavecimbel concerto no 31
Haydn Symphony no 26 "Lamentatione'

In a hall with marvellous acoustics. Ensemble passages sounded as though a full orchestra was there.No room for error and none made. Beautifully played throughout. Great evening.

Geoff

quote:

Wispelwey... A great cello voice !!

Must have been a marvellous evening

cheers
Stefan

Stefan it was...The whole academy has a personality. As for Wispelway he exudes a presence as soon as he walks on stage. Then just starts playing.

Geoff

Just back from Kate Rusby at the Hawth in Crawley. A fine and most enjoyable performance. So different to the last 3 gigs we've been to. Relatively quiet, with her and accordian,bass and various guitars and banjo from the 3rd member.She seemed to be enjoying her self too.

quote:

Originally posted by BigH47:

quote:

Originally posted by David O'Higgins:
I wouldn't judge the venue on what I heard yesterday. Presumably Dylan's people are responsible for the electronic setup which produced such dreadful sounds.

The sad thing is that many people have been reared on this kind of distortion fest and they don't know how much better it could be.

But surely the techs haven't?
Even when you moan to the group , as I did re the Wembley sound for the R30 Rush tour , they do not not even acknowledge your contact.

I can't see a "ban" by annoyed fans helping it will only allow for more tickets to be sold to those who don't care, or go the venue for a chat or see how many drinks they can consume during the performance.

Howard

The last Rush tour I saw had just about the worst sound I have heard for many years. I saw them in Sheffield (Snakes and Arrows tour), and I moved further away from the stage, I was already half way back at the side, but where I was just got echo. A friend who arrived late, sat down straight away, but happened to find somewhere with better, if not good sound.

Another friend was in the third row (lucky), as mostly heard the stage monitor sound, we think, and that was good.

Wembley Arena sounds a lot like hearing a gig in an old swimming pool, perhaps that is why it changed its name from 'The Empire Pool Wembley'. In case people don't know, it was an Olympic swimming pool that was changed to a concert hall, as well as events venue. It was certainly not designed with acoustics in mind.

If you want to hear really good sound in London go to the Royal Festival Hall, or The Queen Elizabeth Hall next door. Sadly stadium acts like Rush will not play there, their loss as much as the audience I hope.

As for refreshments, the bar at the RFH and QEH, as well as the staff, are fantastic, courteous, and treat you as guests and not petty criminals as is the case with many stadium venues.