May 30
So… I’m a huge Ben Folds fan. I’ve been a fan for 20 something years – basically ever since my brothers started being Ben Folds fans. Michael likes Ben Folds, but I’m a bit obsessed. Good news is that now Michael is a bit obsessed as well after this concert.
Michael found these Paris tickets a few months ago and the interesting thing is that he saw there were some VIP tickets for a pretty reasonable price. The VIP involved a 30 minute question/answer session with Ben Folds, a chance to get our picture taken with him and then soundcheck before the show. Now, this gives me a bit of anxiety. What on earth would I say to Ben Folds if I had a chance to meet him? Nothing? I like his music a lot, but I don’t have anything clever to say to him. However, I did think soundcheck sounded amazing!! So we did it.
Now, I’m struggling to figure out what to say in this post. Half of you also love Ben Folds. The rest don’t care about him at all. So, should I just talk about the cool experience or spend this post trying to convince the rest of you why you too should love Ben Folds? (Shout out to Sarah who is sitting next to me and adding value to this post). So I have decided that I’m going to try to convert every one of you to being huge fans! Or at least to find a bit of appreciation.
We arrived around 4pm and got checked in for the event. We soon found out that the group was only going to be 8 other people. So now there is no chance that we can just hide in the back. We are legit going to be talking in a small group with Ben Folds. Anxiety is super high at this point.
We talked with a few other people waiting. We figured out the group was a pilot from the US, some US expats, a few locals and some women from Germany. And us.
We sat down in the first three rows of the theater and after a few minutes, Ben came and sat on a chair right in front of us. That’s right. We’re on a first name basis now. I’m completely geeked.
Ben told us that he started playing music as a percussionist when he was a child and that he experienced, along with a lot of other musicians, is that when he wanted to learn how to play rock and roll, he basically had to just hack through it. There wasn’t really anyone who would tell you about their process or the struggles they had from a musical aspect. So this was our chance to ask questions about music. Since I fall into the category of people who do not play a single instrument and has never taken a singing lesson, this session might end up being a little less technical than he was hoping.
But it ended up being awesome. A few takeaways:
– I couldn’t stop smiling. Aggressively smiling. Michael took a picture of me smiling aggressively but it’s way too much to post here.
– He is really funny, animated, and really down to earth. He mentioned that he basically just doesn’t have time for any drama from other artists.
– When asked about musicians that he liked working with he jumped straight to Sara Bareilles. He loves her music plus thinks she’s an awesome person. I agree.
– Ben is currently working as the first ever Artistic Advisor to the National Symphony Orchestra to work on programming. We knew that he had played with orchestras because we saw him last year with my family when he played with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Another fun fact about Ben is that he composed a piano concerto. We heard him perform it last year.
https://www.thatsonourlist.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/img_0288.movThat wasn’t it… more a sampling of what type of piano work he’s throwing down.
– Now that everyone is on the same page that Ben plays percussion, likes Sara Bareilles, and plays with orchestras, here is a really great video of Sara playing with Ben (who’s wearing an eggplant colored suit and standing up playing a drum of sorts) and the National Symphony Orchestra:
Now, he was playing solo this time around, which was just great, especially since we got to see him during soundcheck!
Here’s what is cool about soundcheck: he will play whatever the small crowd requests. The crowd was the 10 of us from the question/answer section and another five or six people. So we just yelled out his songs and he would play them. Amazing.
We had a list of songs that we wanted to hear, and didn’t get to hear all of them, but loved every moment of it. It was fun seeing him try to hack through his older songs that he didn’t completely remember how to play. It was also super exciting to hear some of my favorites, like the below which is a recounting of my high school time spent in guitar shops… mostly bored:
https://www.thatsonourlist.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/img_0286.movAfter soundcheck we had a little time before the concert, so we left the theater and grabbed dinner next door. And then it was back for more Ben.
Isn’t the theater beautiful?
The concert was great – we were in the fourth row, near the middle so we still had a great view of him.
He apparently hadn’t visited France in something like 10 years, so he played through all of his hits from the early days and a few songs off his new album. But the best thing about his concerts is his story telling.
Hearing him talk about the reasons why he wrote a specific song for his daughter or how his perspective changed on something is so interesting to me.
It’s a little washed out, but look at how excited he is!!
Also this happened which made Michael so happy:
https://www.thatsonourlist.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/img_2477.trim_.movWhile playing the piano, Ben was offered a drum, which he started playing and then had an entire drum set assembled in front of him on stage. It was awesome.
We loved it and my excitement level was off the charts when we walked back to our Airbnb. If you ever have a chance to go see Ben Folds, you definitely should, even if you don’t know his stuff – the music is just good music and the concerts are maximum fun.
That’s right… conducting the audience during a sing along. I just loved it. And we both sang along at the top of our lungs.
I am so excited just reading about the concert and the vip time. So exciting, Jane. And I can’t wait until he is back in St. Louis performing again. It was magnificent for sure! 🙂