Symphonica - Gig Report Verona (September 13)

When you've been through hell, and I guess George Michael knows his way around over there, it's so great when life gives you an unexpected big gift to sort of make up for all the heartache. Singing to an ecstatic crowd in a historical arena on a beautiful, warm summer night might just be such a gift so I hope tonight was as magical and unforgettable for George as it was for us, his fans.

One sentence review: A perfect George in a perfect Arena

Please read on for more details of the night. If you prefer to read the Dutch review, that is over here.

9/11 Ten years on

What is there left to say about September 11, 2001? Maybe all should be silence. RIP: all the people who died that day and in the wars that followed.

Where was I when I heard the news? Well, I was at work, because 9 AM in New York equals 3 PM in the Netherlands. I vividly remember a colleague coming into my office to tell me the news and me laughing in his face in disbelief. Planes flying into buildings? It just couldn't be true, could it? But it was. And the world changed.

Strangely enough my first thoughts of compassion were for those people on the planes, knowing they were being made into a living, dying bomb. No way out. Some of the people in the Towers had a small chance of getting out, they had none.
Then I thought of all the ordinary people working in or near the Twin Towers, going to work today that fateful day with no idea of how terrible a day it was going to be. Acts of terrorism and war destroy the lives of the innocents first and foremost.

CNN.com was down, internet news sites all over the world were down, everyone scrambling to get news updates. In a moment of  inspiration I turned to eBay.com, their messageboards were still functioning. It was unreal, reading about death, destruction and terrorism on the site I had used so much over the years for the innocent pleasure of adding stuff to my various collections. In an seemingly endless thread, post after post told of grief, terror and pain.

Then, and I will never forget this, I saw these words in caps: SECOND TOWER DOWN. More powerful than any image these 3 words for me sum up the horror of  September 11, 2001.

Symphonica, Dutch Review Köln (September 7)

This is the Dutch review for the Köln Symphonica show. The English review is over here.

Er staan al heel veel details over de show van gisteravond in de Engelstalige review. Ik probeer dubbelingen zoveel mogelijk te voorkomen. Dit zijn dus zijn nog wat aanvullingen, voor de mensen op Planet George en andere geïnteresseerden.

Het was weer een bijzondere avond. Om te beginnen werd ik opgewacht door Lindsay van de Aeccess blog van GeorgeMichael.com voor een mini-interviewtje. Complete verrassing, en erg leuk. Eerlijk gezegd, gewoon super cool! Squee! Alleen was ik zo overdonderd dat ik er helemaal niet aan dacht om mijn kleren goed recht te trekken voor de foto. Ik houd mijn hart vast, lol.
Lindsay was heel aardig. Die meid werkt echt hartstikke hard, dat kan je zo zien. Ze zitten veel in de bus, en dan heeft ze dus geen beschikking over internet. Dat moet vreselijk lastig zijn, want dan loop je dus voortdurend achter de feiten aan. Zodra je weer verbinding hebt liggen er natuurlijk stapels emails op je te wachten. Nou ja, ze ziet - neem ik aan gratis - heel veel shows, dus verschrikkelijk sneu is ze ook weer niet.

Ik ook niet overigens, want mijn plekje op de 3e rij van het zijblok was stukken beter dan ik verwacht had. Bijna geheel vrij zicht op het gehele podium en schuin zicht op George. Achter mij zat een Engelse (of Ierse?) fan waarmee ik nog in de rij had gezeten bij The Point in Dublin. Ik blijf me er maar over verbazen hoe klein het fanwereldje goedbeschouwd is.

Enfin, na het gesprekje met Lindsay was er nog maar weinig tijd om alles in gereedheid te brengen:  pen omhangen, notitieblokje in de jaszak, de twittertelefoon voor het grijpen, fotocamera met polsbandje om de pols en GAAN.

De Lanxess Arena staat in de stijgers. De show niet, ondanks de verschuivingen in de setlist . Om in bouwtermen te blijven: Symphonica staat als een huis. George voelt zich duidelijk helemaal thuis bij zijn materiaal en lijkt haast nog meer plezier te beleven aan het zingen van de covers dan zijn eigen werk. Hij geniet van de show, zoveel is wel duidelijk.

Na de jump nog meer details.

Symphonica - Gig Report Köln (September 7)

When George Michael is happy on stage, he is very happy indeed. That wonderful 100 Watt smile of his can light up an place as big at the Lanxess Arena. It's very obvious George is overjoyed to be back doing what he does so well. It's equally obvious that his fans are over the moon to have him back.
There's a lot of love in the air during these concerts, flowing from the audience to George and - rather  more unusual for stars as big as he is - the other way round. It's a quite a special feeling to be part of it all.

There is this one line in Through, the opening song of the show.

They may chase me to the ends of the world, but I got you, babe.

On the first night in Herning he pointed to all of us in the audience, telling us with this one gesture that he's glad we're there for him now that he's hurting so. He didn't do that tonight but even so it's clear that singing for us night after night makes a difference. I'm just so glad that we can help him in some little way. After all, his music has helped so many of us through times of heartache and sorrow it's only right to give something back to him if we can.

One sentence review: George brings a magical night to Köln


Please read on for more details of the night. If you prefer to read the Dutch in-depth review, you can find that here.

Symphonica - Vids and Pics from Herning (August 29)

The concert in Herning on August 29 was my first of the Symphonica Tour and man, was I busy!
I was tweeting just before the start of the concert, in the break and just after the concert when we were stuck in traffic leaving the Arena parking lot.
I shot some very wobbly videos, and took a few pictures, most of which turned out blurry - that left hand of George is the bane of photographers everywhere. Between songs I jotted down some quick notes about the show, trying to juggle camera, pen and notebook.

But more importantly: I drank it all in, seeing George Michael up close again, falling instantly in love with Let Her Down Easy, Going To A Town and most of all Russian Roulette. I was completely taken by surprise by the emotional atmosphere, crying throughout True Faith, You've been loved and of course Where I Hope You are. Back in our hotel I worked through the night, writing reviews. It was an unforgettable experience; I loved every second of it and can't wait to do it all again. Next stop: Köln.

Learned some valuable lessons:

• It's best to hold a camera steady! 
• Gotta practice with that zooming thingy some more.
• Also, unless your voice is pretty great (mine really isn't), you'd better not sing along when you're filming as the camera will pick that up. Ruined a rather good video of the medley that way!
• Uploading HD videos takes forever, that's what's the nights are for.
• Bring Kleenex, lots of it.

Despite some beginners faults I got some priceless George Michael memories out of the Herning trip. You can find some new photos and all the videos I uploaded after the jump.

Symphonica, video Where I Hope You Are (August 29)

This song is just so beautiful, and so sad. I can't even begin to imagine what it must cost him to sing it night after night.
I'll write some more about this song at a later date, for now I just want to share it with you. I haven't put it on my Youtube channel, I don't want just anyone to see it and maybe make fun of George. This is just for us fans.

Now to explain about the wobbly bit in the middle, sorry for that.
 As you can tell from the first half of the video, my new camera has a powerful (12 x) zoom. Because I was sitting so close to George (3rd row) it's as if  you can see even behind his eyes. As I saw him struggling to keep his emotions in check I started to feel very bad for being 'in his face' with my stupid little camera.
Wanting to give him the privacy he deserves I started to zoom out. And then changed my mind again. I loved the song, loved the performance, heartbreaking as it was. So I zoomed in again, but not as close as before, and because filming is not exactly my forte I promptly botched up the zooming action.

You can tell from the first few seconds of Praying For Time when he is turning away from the audience for a bit, that he was still somewhat emotional. We all were! Fortunately, during Praying For Time it got better.

Van Herning, August 29

Symphonica, video True Faith (Herning, Aug. 29)

I'm back home from Herning, but the emotion from the George Michael concert is still with me. It was beautiful, heartbreaking, joyful, amazing. Almost too many emotions to handle. I'm spinning.

Here is a clip of one of high points of the concert, True Faith. At the start of the clip images are very shaky, sorry. It gets better after a while. I was just so excited that George was gonna sing this beautiful song for us.

The new camera - a Panasonic Lumix TZ 8 - is great, though, crystal clear images and sound is not too bad. Now if I could only learn to hold it still, even with George Michael standing a few feet away....

The song starts about 1 minute in; first it's time for a "proper Good Evening Herning". Heh.

True Faith

Van True Faith (Herning)