Gordon Lightfoot Forums - Hershey PA 25 March 2011

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Hershey PA 25 March 2011

Hello everyone,

We're still in PA at my niece's home but I wanted to put something up here. In a word FANTASTIC show! The venue was amazing but we forgot one thing: reservations for dinner. But the pizza was good and it was Friday in Lent but I digress...

We were in the sixth row left on Mike's side. The couple on the aisle "loved Gord forever but this is our first show". I told them he would start at 8 and I gave them the whole recent story and even gave them one joke to listen for. The lights went down at about 7:58 and he hit his first note almost spot on at 8PM EDT.

I won't tell you about his voice because we all know the story. Like has been reported before, the second set is stronger than the first. Carter is wonderful and the sound board was mixed nice and LOUD for once. They were using spotlights when folks did solos and Carter was lit up for a good percentage of the show. I didn't see anyone giving him tips or cues and he seemed to hit everything and then some. Toward the end Gord was "leaning his ear" over to him and smiling pretty big when he finished his riff.

Lizanne wrote a setlist and if no one else puts it up I'll transcribe it here. All the hits except CRT which he explained "we do every other night and this isn't that night" he talked about his hearing problem but said we do EMR tonight and that settled them down.

After the second song someone, understandably, hollered out "where's Terry Gord?" and Gord mentioned that "I was going to talk about that in a few minutes but..." and he introduced Carter quickly. A few tunes later he explained the story in more detail. It seemed more upbeat than some earlier reports.

Sometime later in the show the same guy asked "hey Gord how about doing a tribute song for Terry?" Brief moment of silence - many of us groaned - Gord ignored him and they plowed ahead into the next tune.

Shirt joke came along as reported and my new friend was impressed. "I knew the punchline before my husband" she said at intermission. We were in the reverently quiet (during songs) section.

After the intermission things picked up about 100%, it was remarkable. More talking and a whole lot of laughing and smiling among the band. They were hitting it big time and Carter looked like he'd been doing it with them for years (I guess he has actually). A bunch of chatty song intros.. "second ex-old lady, first ex-old lady" great stuff.

There were two (2) encores and by the end of the show everyone in the band was grinning ear-to-ear and really the crowd was great - standing Os, extended applause, appropriate solo applause and the 2/3 full house was rocking.

After the second encore Gord prowled the stage, shaking some hands and laughing with the crowd. Lizanne said she had "never" seen him in such an upbeat good humor at the end of the show.

I'd give it an A+ and I had to stop our seatmates and ask "what did you think" More smiles and grins from both of them "we loved it - thanks for the history" and they were gone. Happy!

Sorry if this is spotty but I'm reporting from the basement and they're calling me for breakfast.

Peace,

Bill :)