The Miracle Melody Concert - A Review

On July 13, 2004, I've attended The Miracle Melody Concert at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center. The Miracle Melody Concert is a concert in which two reknown pianists - one of them the Prince of Romance, Richard Clayderman, and the second Sasksit V. (Tor) a popular Thai pianists show off their skills and senerade the audience.

On my entry into the concert, I've noticed that on the back rows (cheaper seats), they have decided to raise up the seats by making up a makeshift iron stand. In earlier concerts such as The George Benson concert and the 12 Girl Band - the back rows were not elevated - and many people complained that the back seatings were visually obscure. In this concert they were thoughtful in raising up the stairs though it provided numerous other complications such as noise. At the start of the concert until 30 minutes later, the sound of creaking metal was heard constantly as late people shuffled to their seats making it rather annoying.

The concert itself was very interesting - in which I do want to place some notes down here. First of all, I was surprised to see Richard Clayderman appear on stage to play since the start. As the concert was a duo concert, I thought either they would play together, or Tor would be playing first as an opener to the main concert. After the third song, Tor came up to play one song as a welcoming song for one of the world's most reknown pianist on his first trip to Thailand - which the song was an interesting medley starting with Richard Clayderman's trademark song into a Thai theme song. Later Tor left the stage leaving the Clayderman to continue to senerade the audiences until it ended very abruptly at 9:15 (which was roughly an hour and 15 minutes) just when we all were getting on the mood. There was constant rumors along the crowd as the concert being a little misleading and we were kind of fooled until thinking that Tor's appearance was just a little too cameo. However the announcer annouced later while Clayderman left the stage that there was an intermission, and that Tor would be back to end the concert - which was a rather big surprise considering that the main musicians would usually choose to end the concert not start it ;)

However with some thinking I finally figured a reason why the concert was conducted that way. I think Richard Clayderman may be a rather zealot person when dealing with the tuning of his piano. Since this concert, it was played with the same piano, I think he tuned the piano and wanted to play with that setting. Much like a guitarist who would constantly retune their guitars before every performance - especially classical guitar players - I do think in this format, Clayderman wanted to play the piano after the tuning so that it would be the least deviant from the orginal sound that was tuned. With that reason that is why he chose to start first, in which caused this concert to be rather unconventional.

Anyway, Tor came back on the stage to wrap out the show which ended late at 11:10 which was a feast for the ears.

When reflecting back on the performances, all I can say both talented pianists shown different styles and selection of songs that are of interest. For Clayderman's part, he had a number of musicians - a string section (mostly violin/viola), a drummer, a guitarist, a bassist, and a keyboard (synethesizer) player. In his performance, he choose to play a more well-rounded selection of tunes that range from classic medleys, to pop medleys, a surprise jazz selection, one very interesting medley of cabaret favorites (e.g. I will survive), and rounded off the selection with his most famous track that everyone associated Clayderman with (unfortunately I forgot what the song was called...). In most of his songs, I was very impressed with the arrangements in which his band and Clayderman played very well in harmony or in solo with arrangements that are superbly blended - in which medleys sound like the same song - not a number of different ones ;) The versatility was evident as Clayderman managed to portray many moods from the sombre and elegant classical arrangemnets, to the upbeat and funky jazz selection, to the energetic and infectious cabaret selection, and ending up with a heartfelt encore - though I would complain it was rather short.

After Clayderman's show, the second part of the show by Tor was rather delayed as it took nearly 30 minutes to resume after the break - due to numerous delays. This time a new crew was assembled in the lighting/sound. The musicians were also changed, with a strings section (violins/viola/cello), a drummer, and a bassist. As the show resumed, Tor started out with 2 Bakery Songs - in which was greeted very well by the audience due to the familiarity of the tunes. Later he proceeded to play a very interesting medley that started out with a famous pop song, before turning into "I Believe" (soundtrack of My Sassy Girl), then to Pacabel in D Minor, and ending up with a Thai song. Later he proceeded to play with the audience with his usual style of meekness that was very well appreciated by the crowd - quite similar to his first concert he had. Midway through the concert an invited guest singer came to sing a few songs (I forgot her name) in a rock style, and pop style ballad.

One of the highlights was Tor inviting one of the ladies up on stage. The last time, he asked her to sit with him while he played a senerade for her. This time, he asked her to provide her name which took a while considering her to be pretty nervous. The reason why he was asking for her complete name was he was going to compose a song based on the sound of her name - using improvision techniques which was very interesting - a new trick up his sleeves and a good case of showmanship ;)

It was a few songs later in which the show was concluded with a huge funfare.

As being in the whole concert I did come up with some strange observations that might be funny. First of all I think the crowd somewhat appreciated Tor more than Clayderman - but it might be because of the selection of songs - Tor's selection are popular Thai pop tunes in general, whereas Clayderman choose to make it versatile with less popular songs. Another observation is the language barrier in which Clayderman sometimes had problems communicating with the audiences - though Tor could easily.

The second observation I've noticed is the lighting/audio staff for both shows were different. I talked alittle with Bic who had some experience in organizing shows - on how the quality of lighting in Thai shows somewhat lag behind foreign shows. In the concert, I've also felt that way. In Clayderman's part the lightning and video reflected the emotion of the pianist very well and is structured on the selection of songs well, which isn't quite evident on the second part.

The last observation is the quality of the music. Tor is a very talented pianist and I do think he has done very well to this part. However one point that I do want to mention, the accompanying musicians for Tor's part didn't really sound as good as Clayderman's part. Clayerman's arrangements are very well done and executed, which shows high production value - in which the pianist at times play the lead, sometimes play the accompany, sometimes play the rhythm, and shows it versatility and talent of Clayderman in projecting the emotions :) Since it seems that Tor is moving on the lines of Richard Clayderman in appeal, I do feel that this is one point that should be taken of note as one area that a huge improvement can be placed on to scale to greater height.