Christmas Eve and Other Stories- a concert review

Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Denver CO- 7 December, 2004

For those of you not familiar with the name Trans-Siberian Orchestra (TSO) you are probably still familiar with their songs- Christmas carols with full string sections backing up electric guitars, drums, and keyboards. Yeah, those guys (and girls).
I've been a fan of these guys for years, I picked up my copy of "Christmas Eve and Other Stories" (the first album) the year it came out, 1997. I've had friends go to their shows in the past and rave about how good they were, but I just never made it before. I'm budgeting now for next year's show.

The show is half theatre, half rock concert, and all entertaining. The first half of the show is given over to a Christmas story played in narration and music, the story of an angel sent to earth to see if the spirit of Christ is being kept alive on earth. The stages of his story are told by songs like "An Angel Came Down," "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing," "Christmas Eve Sarajevo (12/24)," and "Old City Bar." The light show is dazzling (but be warned if you are prone to migraines) and "snow" even falls on the crowd at one point.
Christopher Gaynes, the narrator, has a marvelous voice- kind of a Denzel Washington does Shakesspear. The voices of the singers run the gammut from Operatic to R&B/Soul. The only song I didn't care for was the rendition of "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing," becuase the female vocalist devolves the end of it into a "How you doin' tonight, Denver?" with an R&B growl on the ending lyrics. She just dragged it out too long. The rendition of "Old City Bar" (my absolutely favorite song on all three Chritmas albums) was all that I could have hoped for. Every song drew thunderous applause from the audience, some even before the songs were fully over.
The theatre portion of the show lasted about 90 minutes. That alone was worth the price of admission. Then they opened it up and was more like a rock concert. They played several selections from "Christmas Attic," "The Lost Christmas," "Beethoven's Last Night," (an opera), and then one selection from the new album "Night Castle," due out in 2005. The closing number, "Christmas Eve Sarajevo (12/24)" brought the crowd to its feet as the final chords died away.
Then, to make it even better than a rock concert, they announced that they would be doing autographs after the show. There were probably 300-400 people in line, and they (all 15 of the principal musicians and singers) were friendly and made small talk as tehy scribbled their autographs on programs, CD's, and Christmas ornaments. Not only are they are marvelous musicians, but they were all very friendly and appreciative of their fans- which are a broad base ranging from old college professor types to young girls dressed like Amy Lee of Evanescence. If they come to your town go see them. It's much more entertaining than anything on TV.

5 Screaming Flying-V guitars out of 5

Neil