Last concert for the year: Dar Williams

[carynb]

Short Form: mycrazyhair & I made it to the Dar Williams concert at the Church of the Redeemer last night, and it was all good.

A little more detail:
It was really nice to see her perform again - I haven't seen her perform since the Ottawa Folk Festival a couple of years ago. She looked great, and she sounded even better. It was a solo acoustic set, unlike her tour of the States earlier this fall. Just her and a guitar, and I thought it sounded fabulous.

I didn't keep a set list, but from what I can remember? She did a fair number of songs from the new album, and I realized that I like them a lot more than I thought I did. You Rise and Meet the Day for instance - as a quiet, acoustic performance, it's a beautiful love song, but I never got that from the album version. I should have, but the slickness of the production on the album somehow seems to diminish the emotion behind the song. Anyway, I loved the performance of it last night.

As I expected, she did a number of songs from the new album - Close to my Heart, Teen for God, Empire, and Beautiful Enemy, with The Hudson as a requested encore.

My favorites of the evening, though, were her earlier stuff. She asked people to sing along on The Christians and the Pagans, which was fun. The only people I could hear singing, though, were myself & mycrazyhair, which was a little disappointing. Maybe because we were in a Church? When I was a Boy made me choke up, as it always does. February was haunting.

There were lots of little anecdotes between the songs, as usual. I did like her description of the weight and palatte of certain cites, the greyness that big cities have, and the beauty that can be found there.

The audience was a little weird - it appeared full, but it was the quietest concert crowd I've ever been in. Maybe that's a result having it in a church. I mean, I know we're nice, sedate Canadians, but still...

She's a great performer, so I'm very glad I made it last night.