July 4, 2001 performance, reviewed by Dave Conlin Read<\/p>\n
(Originally published on NewBerkshire.com)<\/p>\n
James Taylor’s Fourth of July concert at Tanglewood<\/strong> was one of those events that remind us why the Berkshires is such a great place to live.<\/p>\n From the moment he loped – almost boogied – onstage, until the final note of the fourth encore dissolved, it was clear that JT was really charged up.<\/p>\n “It’s great to be home for Independence Day – there’s no place like Tanglewood. This is great.” In fact, Tanglewood is home for the current tour, which was rehearsed during May at Ozawa Hall<\/strong>.<\/p>\n That alone would be enough to make this gig stand out from the rest, but there was an additional dash of Berkshire spice; as Taylor himself put it, “our own” Yo Yo Ma<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The stellar cellist sat in on Another Day<\/em> in the second set and then returned to accompany Taylor to close the show with a memorable rendition of Sweet Baby James<\/em>. Now that’s a treat, pure and simple. (Cellist Owen Young<\/strong> played the previous night and earlier on this tour)<\/p>\n As delighted as the audience was, Mr. Ma looked even more so; seated on Taylor’s left, he peered up at him, with an ear-to-ear grin, slowly shaking his head as if to say, “I can’t believe how lucky I am.”<\/p>\n There was a visual aspect to the show that was a delightful complement to the aural fix: rough-hewn logs and latticework made it look like the band were playing in a great big mountain lodge, and there was a stunning assortment of images projected on a huge screen behind the set.<\/p>\n This concert was crafted deftly; covering Taylor’s 3 decade career and introducing a trio of songs from his upcoming album, the splendid ensemble of eleven musicians moved through a variety of styles, including bossa nova, rhythm ‘n blues and mariachi.<\/p>\n The timbre of Taylor’s voice has never been so clear and sonorous. He un-slung his guitar for a couple numbers, including Sun on the Moon<\/em>, wherein he got into some funky aerobics while trading lyric licks with his quartet of vocalists.<\/p>\n It was a wonderful event, a pop\/folk\/rock ‘n roll gig served up in some kind of special sauce; the ingredients may be familiar, but the flavor of this show was unforgettable.<\/p>\n The band: Clifford Carter<\/strong> (keyboards), Jimmy Johnson<\/strong> (bass), Russ Kunkel<\/strong> (percussion), Luis Conte<\/strong> (percussion), Bob Mann<\/strong> (guitar), Walt Fowler<\/strong> (trumpet, flugel horn), and Lou Marini<\/strong> (saxophone, flute). Yo Yo Ma makes guest appearance during Fourth of July 2001 Tanglewood concert given by James Taylor and Band.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12,18],"tags":[24,46],"class_list":["post-1035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-james-taylor","category-tanglewood-3","tag-2001-tanglewood-reviews","tag-james-taylor","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1035\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idealpoetry.com\/rwc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSingers: Arnold McCuller, David Lasley, Valerie Carter, and Kate Markowitz<\/strong>.<\/p>\nReviews of James Taylor concerts at Tanglewood and the Colonial Theatre, Pittsfield:<\/h2>\n
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Video clips of James Taylor and Yo Yo MA on Good Morning America’s live broadcast from the Red Lion Inn, Stockbridge, Sept. 15, 2008 <\/h2>\n
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