Posted: 5/30/19 at 9:25am
I was at Yanni last night and the whole evening was pretty surreal. Definitely a fascinating evening from a psychological perspective and a complete 180 from the experience at Morrissey earlier this month.
All big “stars” who perform one-person shows have long bios that don’t think twice about breaking their arms to pat themselves on the back, but Yanni had one of the more outlandish bios I’ve read of late. Some selections:
A legendary composer and performer unlike any other, Yanni has brought hundreds of millions of people throughout the world together through his beloved albums and his incredible live performances. Yanni unforgettable performances...have crossed countless borders, touching billions of people worldwide. (From hundreds of millions to billions- the numbers affected continue to rise as the bio goes on!!) And truly, Yanni’s talent knows no bounds, just as his music knows no borders.
As you can see, we are being set up for almost a Christopher Guest style joke- that no one in the room seemed to be in on!
Unlike Morrissey, who didn’t deign us with his presence until 8:45, Yanni walked out on stage at 8:01. There was no orchestra and no music. The house lights were turned up the entire evening. He walked on, microphone in hand, and spoke to us as if he were Dr. Phil at a live taping. “I don’t really have anything planned and I don’t know how this evening is going to go,” Yanni began (always a terrifying start for any sane person in the audience!), “but I’ll be taking questions from all of you in the audience and answer them the best I can (say what?!) and then I’ll play a little bit when the spirit moves me.”
So the first TWENTY MINUTES was him taking questions from audience members, most which had no question at all. They simply wanted to gush to Yanni and tell him how they had saved their lives through his music. It was like Leap of Faith with Yanni as Raul and the audience was the flock. One woman told him how his music battled her cancer for her; another woman hoped he would dedicated a song to her two year old deaf son and the power would help somehow; a third woman began by telling Yanni that she enjoyed him in his “current energy form.” My favorite was the woman who chastised him for not having a disclaimer to wear water proof mascara because she had been crying the entire evening. (In fairness, so I had, but mine were tears of inappropriate laughter.)
Occasionally he would play a little two minute ditty on the piano- all inoffensive, but they sounded the same to me. Whenever there was too much talking with the audience I longed for a song, but as soon as the songs started I started feeling longing for the Q&A session again.
And then, about halfway through the two hour intermissionless evening, a man got the mic to ask a question and he said, “I love you Yanni, but would you please shut up! We want to hear you play. I didn’t come to hear you talk. Please play your music!” I was DYING. Yanni seemed genuinely thrown off his game and couldn’t fathom that one of his fans wouldn’t want to hear him yammer on for hours about how he overcame his lowest moments or how one should never give up on their dreams.
It truly was a mind-boggling evening, and made you appreciate all the more what someone like Bruce Springsteen did with his one man show.
I truly hope someone at the Lunt is reading this, because I have to give a huge shoutout to the AMAZING ushers house left of the mezz. After the joint passing at Morrissey, they were on top of this keeping this crowd in line.
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