TSO concert rocked, fell silent, rocked again

Another great show from Trans Siberian Orchestra in Jackson this year.  Because of their success in selling tickets (thank you Jackson!) they had two shows on Sunday.  I went to the early show so I could take my 15-year old daughter and her friend to their first “rock” concert.  They loved it.  So did Wife and I.

I’m sure TSO will remember their Jackson stop this year.  About 15 minutes into the show, everything came to a screeching halt.  No music, no lights, no fog.  Nothing.  Apparently, TSO had blown or fuse or tripped a circuit breaker in the coliseum.  Full rock to zippo in no time flat.  Al Pitrelli, who acts as the defacto front man, was a professional as he walked on and off the stage, cracking jokes to the folks close enough to the stage. Everyone feared the concert would be over. A big kudos to the Mississippi crowd for playing nice while the power problem was worked on.

Thankfully, after about 10 minutes, everything powered back up, and the band picked right back up without a missed step.  I couldn’t help wonder that if even with the amazing light show, what things we were missing because the crew was afraid of running everything for fear of another power failure.

I was told that the power problem wasn’t even mention in the late show.

TSO says they always try to top themselves year to year.  They certainly did it.  Much more pyrotechnics, a more sophisticated lighting grid, and more use of lasers.  The music performance was, as always, highly disciplined and spot on.  I particularly found humorous their reference to the internet clip of the house that had Christmas lights programmed to TSRO’s “Wizards in Winter.”  (You can see the clip on planet johnnys web page that is linked in JIT).  The band blew away the amateur’s lighting, and continued to top it with each song the band sequed into.

The teenagers were awestruck by the concert.  In fact, daughter thought that with the first display of pyrotechnics about 20 minutes into the show, that the show was over.  It couldn’t get better than that, she said.  Over an hour later, after the Christmas story part of the show was finished, she thought for sure that the show was over.  There was no way they could top that, she said.  Then the second half of the show kicked in where TSO broke out of the storytelling and really rocked.  Another hour later and the final encore of Christmas Eve Sarejevo, the teens were completely blown away.  They are already saving for next year’s show. And I can’t forget to mention that one of their guitarists came up into the audience and was 10 feet away from us performing a guitar riff during the encore.  The girls enjoyed that little part of the show in particular!

Great stuff again.  Thanks TSO for coming each year.  Thanks to the fans that come out to see them.  I’ll be going to their website next September to see their 2008 tour schedule.