Ν.Υόρκη (N.York) 05/4/2006. Huge success!!

[vitaly2 9]

Briefly: the concert was something extraudinary!

Whoever is within the reach and still has doughts: it's worth to take day off, invent excuses, tell lies to your family etc.

And whoever thinks he must go because this might be the last tour: don't worry - his voice is better than ever, he overdid the two younger ones, and the program is the very best.

Dalaras was ageless, timeless, in his best mood, making his famous faces and gestures, busy conducting the orchestra and the audience.

More details later.

Christo - enjoy your show!!!

[Geske 37]

GOOD FOR YOU!

More details later.

... and we're counting on that

[vitaly2 9]

Ill try to avoid it unnecessary details but youll forgive me if it still sounds as a blog.

Ill start from the weather (thats about the only similarity between the Old England and New England: Weather God is paid much attention): it started snowing in the morning yes! April 5th! Since after the concert-timed flood in Salonica in 2004 I consider such things as personal attacks from the above deity, I thought: Thats it! Ill be buried somewhere around New Haven (opposite to the real Haven, unless you are a Yale College professor) and not even able to return for the Monday concert (we had 5 ft of snow for the April Fools day in the past). Thank you, the Weather God that you changed it to rain!

The Hammerstein Ballroom is a place where wrestling matches take place among other events: it has an empty floor surrounded by raised rows of seats from three sides with the stage at the other side. So, the lucky ones got more expensive seats very far from the stage! And we the cheap ones had standing places right at the barrier few meters from the performers!

Unsurprisingly, they started 30 min late sti ellinikia ora, as someone explained. (My guess is the bar wanted to sell more drinks before everyone got involved too much and stopped feeling pain in their legs and thirst in their throat).

In the beginning they did two or three songs together (those omitted I dont know maybe someone who was present could fill in):

Aspro peristeri

-

-

Then Mihalis was on his own for a while. He is a nice guy and supported Dalaras very well in duets: I would have liked him if I was interested in this kind of music. And he was not irritating at all (my best praise for the music I dont understand). I was not even bored, considering that while Mihalis was doing his jumps on the stage I was able to watch Dalaras fiddling with the amps wires at a 3 m distance too dark for taking pictures, though). Despina was present in and out at various times, both alone and as second voice. She has a pleasant voice and looks promising. Overall, this was a successful collaboration.

Dalaras and Mihalis did together one song - Enas Kompos I Hara Mou

And another - ?

Then Dalaras appeared in his main part (I would say it was not skimpy at all):

Proaisthima

Karavia sti stergia

Palios stratiotis

Pepromeno

Ta veggalika sou matia

Amor, amor

Mia vradia sto Leverkusen

Ki an the thelo

Kali tuhi

Mena parapono pikro

An uparhei logos

Stin Alana

Ksenos

-

Tora klais

Fuge kai ase me With Despina (cheers to Despina!)

with Mihalis - Pou' Nai Ta Xronia

Exo Ena Kafene

With Despina Sta hronia ths upomonis

With Mihalis I fantasia

Skoni

- ? a duet: Mihalis sung in English, Dalaras in Spanish.

Prin to telos

Mihalis sounded very good in those duets.

for Encore

Ti na thimiso, ti na ksehaso

Giorti Zeibekidon

Mi mou thimonis

Stopa kai sto ksanaleo

I nisi tis Aphroditis

During the whole show, Dalaras seemed in the very best mood, he practically owned the audience, his voice was without any flaw, he was not playing but living on the stage (if he was playing, he is an amazing actor!). It seemed they have a very friendly relationship with Mihalis. Mihalis participated in several popular songs from the Dalaras repertoir (Ksenos, Tora klais, Pou nai ta Hronia , Fantasia ), in a curious way: like sometimes you can see in Flamenco shows when at the end the guitarist or singer demonstrates his dancing abilities. Basically, he did not seem to take it seriously (he did his duty, but it felt like a duty) while Dalaras was looking with expectation and approval as a teacher at an exam. Well, I can only say that when Dalaras resumed it felt like a jet in comparison with a paper plane (essentially, its not right to compare apples with oranges: Mihalis cant and is not interested sing oriental). Maybe I am wrong, but in any case he has a lot to learn. (My apologies to Mihalis fans, and he is a nice guy).

They did a generous encore. All the time, Dalaras was greeted very warmly by the audience, including the younger people. Energy of his voice was felt like a physical presence of waves, vibrations, whatever (ya, as usual, boom-boom of the amps made you jump, but thats not what I mean). I have to admit that I personally still feel this energy or maybe its anticipation of Monday

[Christo 9]

Thanks Vitaly

and as you can see 1/2 hour to go

and Im on nmy way

And Hristaki

Im late now

must go

thnks 4 yor wishes meyale

[Geske 37]

Ill try to avoid it unnecessary details ....

There ain't no such thing as unnecessary details where Dalaras is involved

Thank you very much for the account - and also for the recording you uploaded to the rare songs. That's an amazing - and so fast! - job of work.

The song Dalaras sings in Spanish and Xatzigiannis in English is originally by Sting. You know Sting. Dalaras covered his "Mad about you", on I Asfaltos they sing it together. Sting wrote the song as "Fragile" (album "Nothing like the sun", 1987) and he himself covered it in Spanish (this is a lot more difficult for a British tongue than for a Greek one...) as "Fragilidad".

Ever since the Dalaras/Xatzigiannis concerts at Megaro, we've been hoping to hear it by Dalaras&Sting.................

Sorry for going offtopic, but I like him, always have. He's got a good website: http://www.sting.com . I quote from the summer tour announcement: «The Broken Music Tour consists of Sting on bass in a four-piece band with longtime band mate, Dominic Miller on guitar, in addition to Lyle Workman (Beck, Frank Black) also on guitar and Abe Laboriel, Jr. (Paul McCartney) on drums.» In Greece he's got two concert dates: june 16th in Athens and june 17th at the Theatro Gis. Also June 14th in Istanbul.

[vitaly2 9]

Impressions from the Boston concert:

I wanted to post them yesterday right after, but It would have been too many exclamations.

So, after having cooled down, it's just that:

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The program was close to that of NY with addition of

"Ths Agaphs maheria"

and for Encore they did not do Sting but "Vrehei sti kardia mou" by Theodorakis instead. And it was a little shorter - about 15 min.

I don't agree with Christo that it was a Hatsiyannis tour - if Dalaras had performed alone it would have been maybe 1.5 hrs. And the concert lasted about 2.5 hrs.

It did seem a little bit too much of Mihalis (especially since this time I could not watch Dalaras fiddling with amps between his entrances like in NY -I fiddled with my equipment instead).

And his voice was so supernatural that I personally needed a break to catch my breath.

Our Boston audience was very enthousiastic, although some friends expressed their surprise about the theater not being full. Considering that the audience was 99% local Greeks (Boston is not surrounded by a bunch of other metropolis like Vienna), it was VERY full. At the very successful Alexiou concert couple years ago it was much emptier. Which makes you think:

Why there is 0 advertisement for the Greek concerts?

As much as Americans are addicted to baseball, there is a popular series of concerts by the Worldmusic program. It had hosted Eleftheria Arvanitaki, Paco de Lucia, and Flamenco shows are getting more and more popular.

Why didn't they even put a neon sign at the Hammerstein Ballroom the night of the NY show!?? (There was such sign at the Wang in Boston).

Well, it's been easy to get tickets, on the other hand...

[Christo 9]

I don't agree with Christo that it was a Hatsiyannis tour - if Dalaras had performed alone it would have been maybe 1.5 hrs. And the concert lasted about 2.5 hrs.

Well I can see here you picked up from my little subliminal quote.

I wasnt in Boston nor was in NY so if you got a good show

lucky for you and BAD for me

you say Dalaras was on stage about 1.5 hrs

Interesting

I don't know how thats possible but if you say so then

WHY NOT IN CHICAGO?????????????????????????????

At best he was on stage for 1/2 hour alone

and if you were to have seen him in chicago like i did you would not be disagreeing with me as you are now

Did he give his best there in chicago

Hell NO he gave it his worst by giving it to Hatziyannis.

And the time he was on stage Most of it was with Hatzyiyannis singing his songs

This was the worst concert for Dalaras I have ever seen and for me the absolute worst to see him like this live especially from out of town as a specatator!

if this keeps up I will not see him ever again like this!!

Voula still waiting to hear from your thoughts

that is if you'd like to express them

BTW, I havent given a full blown scenario of what actually transpired in Chicago. I'm still recovering from the aftershock and all the doubt from what took place. Standby as i may or may not still post.

[vitaly2 9]

Dear Christo:

I thought at first I'll tell you how sorry I am that you are upset.

No, that's not true - I am telling YOU ARE ONE LUCKY GUY !!!!!!

If this is the worst concert you've seen.

Think how many BEST concerts you've seen. ??

I ENVY YO SO MUCH !!!!!!

So, we both tell the truth - I've never seen Dalaras perform like this "free-style" before. My first concert went down the drain in Salonika together with the audience (the performers escaped). The second one was academic were he never smiled. Then Oedipus, and a rembetiko where he did not sing alone + bad sound.

If you look a the program: he did 12 songs alone = about 1 hr, then 1/2 hrs together with Hatsiyannis (why you discard this part?).

I can tell again: it was a unique harismatic concert by Dalaras, however much time he "gave" to the collaborators.

I can also add another reason why I believe that the concert was a unique experience, although it's more personal: my husband have always hated all "Eastern" music. He reluctantly went with me. Now he is giving me hard time by playing only Dalaras CDs in the car (yes, it can be too much because I drink only when I am thirsty).

P.S. when I asked my husband for permission to be mentioned on the forum, he said to send his congratulations to everybody with the today's 45-th anniversary of the 1st Man in Cosmos!

[Christo 9]

Dear Vitaly

I must first come out with an apology

I was very rough on you and shouldnt take it out on your performance or experiences. It's just that chicago this time for me was terrible more so horrible then you could imagine.

I'm still deciding whether or not to post the entire story or not.

Maybe I'll wait for Hristakis thoughts and experiences from toronto to post first before I do.

This is not the Dalaras I'm accustomed too or use to seeing such as this; but before I can criticise why I felt its so bad I need to explain everything in detail and I'm just not ready to do so at the moment.

forgive for so now but give me a few more days and i may change my mind ok

thanks

and glad your show was good

as for now I'll only quote this "I only want to see Dalaras as he is by himself with no one else now"

p.s. I too am listening to his Best Classic songs in the car

and seems like thats only way I'm finding to enjoy him now

Pity he didn't deliver to do so like this in chicago

[Bithidalaras 27]

My opinion of these concerts in America cannot be clear as I didn' t have the chance to attend them! I wanted, though, to say what I think about the participation of Dalaras in the programme! Last year I watched twice the programme with Remos in Athinon Arena, and I can say that I was not pleased at all with the time that George was on stage alone! Depending to this experience, I guess that the same happened to the America tour! Hatzigiannis is a great singer for his style of music, but he can' t sing Dalara's songs at all! So even if they were together on stage, and even if they were singing George's songs, I would not be pleased! In addition, if I was living in America, I would prefer to see Dalaras alone! What I want to say is that coming to America with Hatzigiannis was a mistake, in my opinion... Finally, I' d like to say that the best concerts of Dalaras are those that he is singing alone! E.g, the tribute to Tsitsanis or Vamvakaris... Unfortunately he has been too flexible with his co-singers in the last years, and this is bad for his image, as also for his fans who want to enjoy him!!

[vitaly2 9]

I don't want to be boring - just must add that many of us would like to see Dalaras perform only for the forum members!

(and even in this case fighting about the program seems unavoidable...)

We must remember that in real world, many obstacles exist which prevent Dalaras from doing exactly what he wants and what we want... Dalaras is the essence of TRUTH, and fighting almost alone against the lies of today's "entertainment" industry.

He is "δροσονεράκι της ερήμου" - and in the desert you cherish every drop of water and not ask for a bucket...

P.S. don't you think that he is not as egoistic as we are, and so he performs together with Mihalis hoping that more young people would come and have a chance to hear a real music first time in their life (that's not just a guess - a fact relating to a young friend who attended the Boston concert)? I don't believe that money is the reason.

[Bithidalaras 27]

Neither do I! I just think that an artist like Dalaras, with such a huge past behind him, should try to make choices that suit his range! Dalaras is considered, and he is, the biggest living Greek artist! I don' t know much about how the music industry works, but I think that he has the power to organize a tour to America, in which he would sing alone...

[Christo 9]

Hey Guys

I do need to add too my postings

from the concert

perhaps over the weekend

after you hear what happened from my enconter

then we can try to put all the resoning

together and see why the guesses were coming up with

are correct or not

Dear Vitaly

I will post give me a few more day

thanks

Kane liyo Ipomoni

[vitaly2 9]

Dear Christo:

I think I understand what happened - it's all my fault: you had wrong expectations because I showed too much excitement in my after-the-concert post.

Please forgive me: this is a classic case for a psychology textbook - unbalance of expectations and results. When someone tells me what a great movie - I'll never like it.

I had low expectations: loud amps drive me crazy, I don't believe in my luck

+ it started snowing. There was no sign on the Manhattan Center, then it looked inside like a stable rather than a concert hall

Then I saw Dalaras at 5 m distance and even was able to hear through the amps (after having stuffed my ears). Well, it was a happy end, and I successfulley filtered all non-relevant things, like non-Dalaras performers.

Sorry, if this story makes me laugh

It's not at you - I am laughing at myself. I am still happy...

I hope you'll get a chance soon to get compensated at a solo concert of Dalaras. Whatever happened, I am sure it's not his fault...

P.S. One reason for my low expectations was an experience that they often don't take seriously the diaspora audience - Russians, too. Let's go to Greece.

[fadi 2]

can you give any information about the singer "Despina"?!

again,Great feeling to read your thoughts,while listening to Vitally's recordings (What a great surprise (shiver) you made me by "vrexei sti Ftoxoyitonia!!))-AYYDEE!

HE IS THE GREATEST!!

[christos-regnis 57]

but he can' t sing Dalara's songs at all!

How do you come to this conclusion? Obviously, you 've never attended them live together...

[vitaly2 9]

can you give any information about the singer "Despina"?!

Fadi, she is Despina Olimpiou - as new as they say, she had at least 2 personal CDs.

BTW look for a video clip here:

http://rapidshare.de/files/18113982/Dalara...rasNY2.wmv.html

[Agnie 1]

It doesn't work the link

Could you uploading it again????

[vitaly2 9]

Try the Dalaras Videos section - it's the same link, I don't understand why it's not working from here... :blink:

Actually, here it is:

http://rapidshare.de/files/18113982/Dalara...rasNY2.wmv.html

[Christo 9]

Well after reading most peoples comments

how well Canada was and New York with Boston went,

I felt extremely reluctant to post my opinions from the tour almost to the point it would be a waste and troublesome to write and tell.

But it seems as if not everyone still agreed on certain things

therefore, I may still post yet.

Now people please note and take into consideration,

in that Not that I'm a bad guy or anything

but my point of view will NOT be pleasant to read

dont be discouraged if it comes out like I'm anti-dalaras now or hateful because thats certainly not the case.

Its just this: Simple put, I will present an argument as to why It was NOT good and try to point out instances or state a fact as to provide support in proof as to my argument of mine.

Stay tune

as it takes time ro write it out

:blink:

[Anna 752]

Christo, I attended the 'show' in Atlantic City and I didn't like it very much. So, if Chicago was about the same, I'm sure I will understand your feelings.

[Alexandros 22]

Christo:

Please feel free to post your feelings here. I too had some mixed reaction to the show I saw. But I only presented the positives, because I know certain people just could not handle it.

What I do not understand is this: George Dalaras is a musician. He is not God, he is not immortal. Unfortunately there are people who, it seems, live their life by him. I love the guy as a musician and nothing else. I have all his cd's, dvd's, and bootleg videos. I have autographs and pictres. I play his music all the time (it drives my fience NUTS!!!). But that is where I stand. I love Greek music in general. I have over 3000 cds to prove that!

In the end, Dalaras is your average business man. Yes he is there to give us his musial talent, to interpret songs and give wounderful shows. BUT, he is also there to make money. People cannot seem to get by that.

Also, he is very political. In Greece he has shown support for the comunist, and in the US he is against the war in Iraq and Bush. Why do you think people boycotted him this year? They have they're feelings and wanted to prove their point. In Canada he was recieved a little better, but it still was a little cold from his perspective. Others will disagree with me, but that is the way I see it.

I am not anti-Dalaras or anything. but there are people who see this man as a God like figure, and not like a human being.

[Alexandros 22]

Christo, please give us your response here. Inquiring minds want to know. I could give two shits what anyone thinks around here. Post you feelings man........I'm with you on this one...

[Geske 37]

In the end, Dalaras is your average business man.

That he is not - he doesn't value money enough. Some artists are really very bad businessmen and never have a cent, well, Dalaras is not like that, he's too intelligent. But he is not, either, anything like those musicians who really care about being paid as much as possible and investing the money where it will bring good returns and so on..... except if you consider restoring the Appolo Theatre on Syros as "good returns". It is, but not in the business sense.

[Alexandros 22]

What I meant was that this is not only his hobby and joy, but his job. Just like I am an engineer, he is a musician. He is doing it to make money. Or else he would be working in a KAFENE..