Elton Tribute at Carnegie Hall
Following in the tradition of the amazing Joni, Dylan and Bruce tributes it was Elton John’s turn at Carnegie Hall last night. And once again i was the lucky host announcer, aka ‘the voice of god’ (others said that about me, not me!) as I did the artist intros from offstage. BernieTaupin was in the house!! Comparatively speaking, Elton and Bernie’s music is tough to cover. True, there are so many great songs but they really rely on performances and great singers. So no surprise that Phoebe Snow was the highlight, getting a standing O as the 4th performer with her poignant version of Empty Garden. I was crying. Clearly, the artists choose their songs and many had interesting stories about their picks. The show was light on the Elton arena hits for the most part with many more coming from the prime early 70’s period. For my own research for the show I been listening to alot of Elton this past week. I stand by Nikita and Border Song as my Elton faves! All in all a great show, once again to raise money for Music For Youth. Happy to be a part of it! Special shoutout to the house band --Fools for April.
Here’s the set list:
Naked Eyes-Rocket Man
Shawn Colvin-Sacrifice
Fools for April-Mona Lisa and Mad Hatters
Phoebe Snow-Empty Garden
Page McConnell-Amoreena
Pernice Brothers-Country Comfort
Kristina Train-Ballad of a Well Known Gun
Aimee Mann-My Father’s Gun
School of Rock Allstars-Love Lies Bleeding
Roger McGuinn-Friends
Buddy-I’m Still Standing
Howard Jones-Tiny Dancer
Joshua Radin-The Border Song
Jill Sobule with Ethel-Levon
Roy Ayers-Bad Side of the Moon
Lizz Wright-Come Down in Time
David Broza-Your Song
Raul Malo-Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word
Ryan Shaw-Guess That’s Why They Call it The Blues
Peter and Gordon-I Want Love