| champagne flutes, rockstar dreams |
well, sarah and i spent last weekend down at grandma and grandpa’s.
and i got to hear my niece hayley playing flute.
i was actually quite impressed.
sadly, though, my sister – hayley’s mother – has yet, for some unknown reason, failed to turn hayley on to someone who no doubt would quickly become her musical idol were she to invest a few minutes taking in the brilliance of the following youtube clips.
so, hayley, i have the supreme honor of presenting to you mr. ian anderson and his multitudinous and voluminous talents.
the first video is a fairly recent clip. it shows ian the elder statesman playing a couple of tunes with an orchestra at a Christmas gathering three years ago.
the second is ian in his prime – the showman and the entertainer as much as the breathy flautist. here he is doing the ian-flute-solo thing before 40- or 50- or 60- or 70,000 tull fans at tampa stadium. tull was huge in the mid-70s, selling out five consecutive 20,000-in-attendance-each-show nights at the la forum and three at madison square garden on one tour. hayley, make sure you watch the whole thing – i expect a note-for-note and growl-for-growl rendition the next time i’m in perry…
and, finally, a clip from the 1978 madison square garden dvd i mentioned a few posts back. this is ‘the middle part’ of ‘thick as a brick’ – and you should log onto amazon immediately after watching these clips to order a copy of both the taab CD and the msg dvd.
(using kelly’s credit card, of course…)
oh, and tell your momma two things: one, i haven’t bought the msg dvd yet; and, two, my birthday is in six weeks.
one more thing: click here for ian’s discussion of the flutes he uses.
enjoy.
amazing…it’s a wonder he didn’t hyperventilate in some of those performances…very impressive to your sister and niece…although niece didn’t care for the sweat on his face but WAS impressed at the talent…typical teenage girl. where did all his hair go????? by the way, niece’s one act drama competition sat. got first place in STATE.
re: the hair… it’s funny – ian and martin barre (guitarist – nice 70s-ish-suited guy above…) were doing an interview about 15 years ago. martin said they need to stick around another decade or so to ‘at least see how much hair we’ve got.’ and ian pipes in, ‘hairs, martin … let’s remain optimistic.’ he always had a severely receding hairline. today he generally plays with a bandana covering his head so he can rock like a kid but not look like a nursing home resident…
glad you liked the videos, hayley. he mentions powell flutes in the link i added – i looked at their website and it seems they run about $7500 each. so, after you order the taab cd and msg dvd, and while you still have my sister’s credit card…
-mr
oh, and CONGRATULATIONS on winning STATE! way to go!!!