Once upon a time, I thought that a wild night of music at the Ravinia Festival was Richard Strauss’s opera “Elektra” with Leonie Rysanek in the cast. But things were really rockin’ and rumblin there tonight, courtesy of one of the best musicians on the planet, James Taylor. My wife and her friends Val and Kate are avid fans of his and as soon as they found out that he was going to be there this weekend (this was earlier in the year) they vowed to get tickets, no matter the cost – if it meant selling their bodies to science – or joining the Peace Corps for ten years. One way or another, we were going to be at this concert. A whole lot of other people were bound and determined as well, and indeed both his Friday and Saturday concerts completely sold out on the very first day that tickets were on sale. (One of the staffers told Jeff tonight that on nights that are complete sell-outs, the estimate is that 30,000 people are there.) Fortunately, we were among the blessed folks who managed to purchase tickets that first day (which, as it turns out, was also the last day) that tickets were for sale.
Unfortunately, in keeping with most of the rest of this past week, we experienced some meteorological misery shortly after arriving at Ravinia. We had packed what appeared to be a twelve-course picnic lunch which we had intended to eat on the festival grounds- but after standing with an enormous mob of people outside the entrance, waiting in vain for the gates to open, and with dark storm clouds rumbling behind us in the distance, we decided that the prudent course of action would be to head back to the van and enjoy our meal there. And it ‘s a good thing we did because we found ourselves pelted by at least two downpours that would have drenched us had we been on the grounds. Our Subway sandwiches, vegetables and dip, chips and salsa tasted just fine- better, in fact, than if we had been caught with them in the deluge, trying to keep both ourselves and our food dry! Eventually the rains did stop and we finally made our way to the festival grounds around 6:30 or so, an hour before concert time. . . half expecting to see a big Ark under construction in the middle of the park!
But enough of the preliminaries. What mattered most, by far, was this incredible concert! First of all, James Taylor both looks and sounds exactly like he sounded 10 or 15 years ago. The guy is aging beautifully! That voice is still so silky smooth – and it still soars into its upper register with such beauty and grace. And what a musician this guy is! He just has this extraordinary capacity for “Selling a Song” – for giving his all to each song but not in a way which overpowers the song or distracts us from its essential meaning.
Other things to be happy about. . . It was a substantial concert. I very quickly lost count of how many songs he did but nearly every big hit – Fire and Rain, Shower the People you Love with Love, Carolina on my Mind, How Sweet it is to be Loved By You, Sweet Baby James, You’ve Got a Friend – was there. And among the new additions to his concert lineup were some truly stunning cover versions of fine songs by other composers. Some of these were brand new to us, but I’m pretty sure everyone there already knew ‘O what a Beautiful Morning” from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Oklahoma.” But none of us had ever heard it sung so exquisitely as it was tonight. I thought that this single song was easily the high point of the concert – and was the song which easily justified the cost of our $110 tickets.
For the first time in any of my previous visit, they had large screens off to the side upon which were projected various images from the stage. There really aren’t any horrible seats in the pavilion, but we were plenty far away and welcomed the chance to see some things that we would otherwise probably never have seen, including images of the pianist’s fingers roaring across the keys – or the superb work done by the wind players or the backup singers – and of course, for much of the time what we saw on the screen was James Taylor himself. ( I loved his first entrance, as the audience was applauding the entrance of various stage musicians as they made their way to the stage. . . and then suddenly we realized, without a hint of fanfare, that James Taylor himself was among them. Such a delightfully unassuming guy.)
From there the concert was one delight after another- and part of the fun was being there with folks who were enjoying it every bit as much as I did. (Val and Bob Conner actually spent a few minutes during the second act dancing in the aisle.) One source of frustration was that the folks out on the lawn were not the least bit quiet. In fact, even during some of the gentlest songs, it sure seemed to us like 25,000 people were out there talking at the top of their lungs and seemingly oblivious to the wonderful concert going on. (The music is piped all over the grounds, and a lot of people listen to the concert much the same way as they would if this were just a CD or your set of CDs coming off of their shelf.) So that was irritating, and at several points during the concert I was really hoping that Kate, Kathy and Val – teachers all in the Racine Unified School District – stand up and in iciest voice as “teacher’s voice” would get people quieted down.
But that concern was truly small potatos. . . compared to the riches we all experienced in the pavilion. In song after song after song James Taylor seemed to revel in its deepest poignancy – expressing each and every song without any sense that he was just walking through it. And how he managed to remember the lyrics of song after song after song without any sort of visual aid (no notes – no teleprompter) was astonishing.
Something else I loved about the concert- and I have loved this about some of his other projects – is James Taylor’s generosity with the spotlight. He is always careful to introduce each and every band member by first and lesson names. . . first name, then last, plus a few words about what makes him or her special. And at the end of the concert (ahead of several ) James Taylor and every instrumentalist and backup singers was standing in a line along the front of the stage, bowing together. I like that when an audience’s applause is not taken for granted, but rather is warmly and sincerely acknowledged.
One more little negative thing. . . the James Taylor t-shirts they were selling started at $40 . . . but all the same, all three wives bought one – and Val and Kate actually managed to get theirs autographed by him during intermission. Yet another reason to love the guy- his approachability, his kindness and patience with his fans, and his extraordinary sense of patience.
And when he was up there singing songs like “Shower the people you love with love” or “You Got a Friend” – – – I found myself with tears streaming down my cheeks, feeling incredibly lucky to be experiencing this great concert at Ravinia. . . . and with our good friends the Barrows and Conners joining us. True, it was no Elektra – but if you really want to know the truth, this was even better.
pictured: towards the end of the James Taylor concert. I love how the spectacular light emanating from the stage to the auditorium illuminated the heads of the audience members. You’ll see that in the photo above which really gives a sense of the electricity that was in the room during this concert.