Celtic Woman

Last Tuesday night I went and saw Celtic Woman perform at the E-Center in Salt Lake as part of their Isle of Hope tour.  They were amazing.  Virtually everything about the concert was amazing.  It was so great!

I have known about the group for about 18 months now, and when I first heard them I immediately bought all of their CDs and DVDs.  I loved their music.  But somehow I missed out on hearing about their 2008 tour, so I missed when they came to Salt Lake last year.  While I was visiting my parents over Christmas break this last year I saw that they were coming to Salt Lake for their upcoming tour, I immediately bought a couple tickets in eager anticipation of being able to see them live. 

I did have a little bit of trepidation about that whole “live” part of the show.  The vocals on the DVDs are clearly dubbed with post-produced studio recordings, and there is some talk around the Internet that the girls they selected for the group were selected more for their appearance than their voices.  So I felt like there would be a small possibility that this concert would be lip-synced, which would have been a big letdown for me.  I don’t really want to pay to see a group if I’m just going to hear a recording; I can do that at home.  But it wasn’t lip-synced.  It was definitely live.  At least the vast majority of it.  (There were two songs that may have been pre-recorded; I couldn’t be 100% sure either way.)  The girls are amazing vocalists.  Every note on pitch.  Perfect articulation.  Great expression.  Tasteful choreography.

Being the techie guy that I am, I spent nearly as much time taking in all of the technical aspects of the show as I did the music… the lighting, sound system, sound mix, acoustics, etc.  It was all extremely well done as well.  I was definitely impressed.

I had no idea how long the concert was going to be.  It went on for quite a while before they announced an intermission.  Awesome!  We were only half way through.  In all the concert was well over two hours long.

I was so impressed with the whole performance that later that night after I got home I logged on to the Celtic Woman web site to see if there was any possibility I could see them again on their current tour… maybe in Las Vegas or Denver?  With the exception of a handful of performances last week, the rest of the performances are far away in the southeast.  Far enough away that going to another show was going to be difficult.  I saw that there is going to be one in Tulsa at the end of June, and this would have been a good excuse to visit my parents for a few days, but that concert is on a Sunday night, and I didn’t feel right about doing that.  So, I was kind of disappointed that I wasn’t going to be able to pull it off.

That was until I opened the back of program I got at the concert and saw that they had two performances coming up in Denver at Red Rocks Amphitheater that aren’t listed on their web site.  Wheels start to turn.  What do the tickets cost?  Are any good seats still available?  What about airfare?  Check the price of hotel and rental car.  Then I decided that I was just going to do it.  Enter credit card number into the various web sites… so, yep, it’s a done deal… I’m flying to Denver to see them perform at the beginning of July.  And my ticket for the concert is RIGHT in the MIDDLE of the FRONT ROW (well, technically it’s the second row, but the actual first row is reserved for special needs visitors)!  Woohoo!  Major excitement going on.

So yeah, I’m going to fly somewhere just to see a concert.  That’s a first for me.  And I’m very excited about it, even if it is going to cost me a small fortune to do it.