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NEWSLETTER
| Adams connects with NAC crowd |
| Monday, 24 August 2009 | |||
 Bryan Adams in concert at the National Arts Center in Ottawa Well, they should have seen how warm, chatty and open he was during an unplugged performance at the National Arts Centre last night. There was no sign of snobbery as Adams, in jeans, boots and a button-up shirt, settled onto a stool on stage, acoustic guitar in hand. He broke the ice with one of his best songs, Run To You, and forged an instant connection with the crowd by deconstructing a section of the song. As he plucked the motif, everyone in the sold-out audience echoed it with handclaps. “I’ve played this venue a couple of times,” he said in greeting, recalling that he and his band members were dressed in white the last time, about nine years ago. For this visit, he was joined by a solitary accompanist: pianist Gary Breit. “Tonight I have a whole lot of other songs to play,” he added. “I’ll try to condense 30 years in two hours. I don’t know if you got the memo or not, but this is an acoustic show, and this is the band.” He gestured to include himself and Breit. At press time, among the songs they had performed were Here I Am, which Adams sung partly in French (to the delight of the fans), Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven, Let’s Make a Night to Remember, I Thought I’d Seen Everything, Summer of 69 and When You Love Someone. Adams’s voice sounded fantastic, a touch less gritty and more warmly musical than expected, even when he pushed to the high notes. Breit’s playing on the grand piano filled out the songs nicely, elevating them beyond campfire fare. Between songs, Adams talked about his songwriting and shared at least a couple of secrets, including the tidbit that he would have liked to have had lunch with actress Sandra Bullock when his song was used in one of her movies. One big surprise was a rare appearance by Adams’ former songwriting partner, Jim Vallance, who took a turn at the piano for a nice rendition of The Best is Yet To Come, one of dozens of hits they wrote together in the 1980s. “We’ve only done that twice, and that was the second time,” Adams said. Source: ottawacitizen.com (article and photo)
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