Some thoughts on Vegas and music
April 7, 2006 | 7:54
am
1. According to the AP, yesterday the official word came that Reba McEntire will host the Academy of Country Music Awards which takes place May 23 at the MGM Grand. Of course, McEntire will soon also be joining Barry Manilow as a headliner at the Las Vegas Hilton.2. A couple days later on, May 25, VH1 will be taping "VH1 Rock Honors" in Las Vegas (though it won't air until May 31). This tribute will honor Queen, Def Leppard, Kiss and Judas Priest.
3. Last night, in a rare treat for Las Vegas, a Nobel Prize winning novelist came to give a speech. According to the Review-Journal, talking to a packed auditorium at UNLV, Toni Morrison spoke of how overwhelmed she was to the point of being silenced by Katrina and the subsequent events in New Orleans. But Morrison noted how seeing one displaced saxophonist from New Orleans playing a small benefit in a tiny New York church helped her move forward again. "How deep unlivable, insufferable existence becomes when we are deprived of art," Morrison told the audience. She also noted:
I believe the New Orleans musician is alright. He has friends, fans, a community, so I'm not worried about him. But what I do worry about is the thought of suppose he had not been there at that particular moment, and that is the thought that leads me to contemplate with real dread the erasure.
I wish I had been there to see Morrison speak. But I was saving myself for tonight.
Tonight I am seeing the most inspiring artist in my universe, Bob Dylan, perform at the Aladdin. As my best friend is out of it from a car accident, it looks like I will be going alone. But I will not be by myself, because that is what art does for us all and though I wasn't there, I am fairly sure what Morrison meant: great music takes our most private self and shows that it is shared by a community. How surprising is that? Really. And, yet how special and essential to grasp that moment even in as ephemeral experience as a concert.
How can I be alone amongst so many other Dylan lovers---people to whom his unique vibe means as much to them as it does to me? How could so many of us exist? Of course, then there is the man himself, The Bob, offering those songs that I consider the ultimate expression of the human condition. Why do I feel so special? I am lucky to love music and to be in a town that so honors it.
Photo by David Umberger/AP
And the Dylan show was excellent. As was the show in Reno the week before. The Aladdin Theatre is a great venue, and I don't think it's just because I was in the 6th row. Maybe Bobby D. and Paris Hilton will hook up on the next tour.
Posted by: Gump | April 10, 2006 at 04:41 PM