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Re: Barber's 10 Points To A Great Concert



On Sun, 26 Dec 1999 09:05:55 -0500, "Brian Cady" <cadyb@home.com> ,
late of Pablo Fanques Fair wrote:

>Not really about The Who but it is about live shows which some of us have
>seen lately and I thought this was so to the point (and might generate
>lively discussion) that I thought I'd post it here.  This is by Nicholas
>Barber from Sunday's The Independent:

These were all good suggestions. Thanks for posting them.

>3. Think About Pacing. One of the confessions which turn up regularly in pop
>interviews is, "We vary the order of the songs from night to night, so that
>it doesn't get boring for us." But who cares if it gets boring for you? What
>about us? We like our entertainment to be organised for maximum possible
>momentum and drama. We don't expect a film projectionist to run the reels in
>the wrong order to stop himself getting bored and we don't expect theatre
>actors to mix up scenes.

This I found particularly pertinent. If playing your own music bores
you, maybe you need to find a different profession. I'm a performing
musician myself, and sometimes I do 4 shows in a day. I always
remind myself that while it is my fourth show, it is the audience's
first show.

I occasionally read comments from someone who is seeing their 3rd or
4th show of the tour, complaining that the set list hasn't changed
from night to night. Well, if they ever start worrying about the
.001% of the audience that is following them around tour, they would
be making a serious mistake in judgement. 99.99% of the audience
each night is seeing the band for the only time this tour, and
deserves the best show possible.


-- 
Kevin B. O'Brien                  TANSTAAFL
kob1@ix.netcom.com
"One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief
that one's work is terribly important." -- Bertrand Russell

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