It was like Christmas all over again. Ellen got her long-held wish, and I was along for the ride. We went to see Richard Thompson at the Kent Stage last night. It was an amazing show!! He was performing "1000 Years of Popular Music".
We arrived at the theatre, found our seats, and discovered that we were in the middle of a sea of khaki pants and alpine designed sweaters. On a sea of middle aged couples. We were the youngest people there. Ok, not really. There were a couple of kids that had been dragged there by their parents, and a couple of college students (it is next to Kent State University, after all). But other than that, yep...us.
The crowd was rather annoying. It was made up of old folkies who thought they were being witty when they were yelling things at the performers. Thompson took it in good stride, but his wittiness blew them out of the water. And I suppose the piece de resistance was during several of the songs when we looked over to see these middle aged white guys bobbing their heads in time to the music. Or, not in time to the music as the case may be.
But, enough about the crowd. Richard Thompson was incredible. He came out playing a hurdy gurdy and singing a song from 1290. We jumped forward a few years, then skipped the "black death" ("...nothing musical of note. It's my pustule and I'll cry if I want to."). We ventured forward, heard a madrigal and a carol, and kept moving forward into the 1500's - 1600's - 1700's. We stopped for quite a while in the nineteenth century, and finished the first set with some Gilbert & Sullivan.
On the way, he told a joke (several actually, but this one was a joke rather than witty repartee):
For the encore, he played something from the 90's. The 1190's. A song composed by Richard I.
Here is a pretty decent sampling (albeit short) of the 1000 years of music show:
And here is one of my favorite Richard Thompson songs - 1952 Vincent Black Lightning:
All in all, it was a great show. I wish he had performed some of his own music, but that just means we'll have to go to another show!!
We arrived at the theatre, found our seats, and discovered that we were in the middle of a sea of khaki pants and alpine designed sweaters. On a sea of middle aged couples. We were the youngest people there. Ok, not really. There were a couple of kids that had been dragged there by their parents, and a couple of college students (it is next to Kent State University, after all). But other than that, yep...us.
The crowd was rather annoying. It was made up of old folkies who thought they were being witty when they were yelling things at the performers. Thompson took it in good stride, but his wittiness blew them out of the water. And I suppose the piece de resistance was during several of the songs when we looked over to see these middle aged white guys bobbing their heads in time to the music. Or, not in time to the music as the case may be.
But, enough about the crowd. Richard Thompson was incredible. He came out playing a hurdy gurdy and singing a song from 1290. We jumped forward a few years, then skipped the "black death" ("...nothing musical of note. It's my pustule and I'll cry if I want to."). We ventured forward, heard a madrigal and a carol, and kept moving forward into the 1500's - 1600's - 1700's. We stopped for quite a while in the nineteenth century, and finished the first set with some Gilbert & Sullivan.
On the way, he told a joke (several actually, but this one was a joke rather than witty repartee):
- Heaven: The English greet you at the door, the French do the cooking, the Italians provide the entertainment, and the Germans organize everything.
- Hell: The French greet you at the door, the English do the cooking, the Germans provide the entertainment, and the Italians organize everything.
The second set moved forward to the 1940's and focused on a song or two per decade up to 2006. We heard songs by the Beatles, Abba, Billie Holliday, and others. My favorite was See My Friends, by the Kinks. Thompson's version was abso-freakin'-lutely amazing!! He finished with a Nelly Furtado song. In order to bring the end of the show back full circle to the beginning, they switched in the middle to Latin, and slowed it down like early church music.
For the encore, he played something from the 90's. The 1190's. A song composed by Richard I.
Here is a pretty decent sampling (albeit short) of the 1000 years of music show:
And here is one of my favorite Richard Thompson songs - 1952 Vincent Black Lightning:
All in all, it was a great show. I wish he had performed some of his own music, but that just means we'll have to go to another show!!
