Guus Bosman

Thursday evening we went to see Lenny Kravitz in the MCI center in D.C.

Sasha knows that I am a big fan of Kravitz, and when she found out he was coming to Washington she had arranged tickets for the show -- a wonderful gift.

We were early at the center, and we had dinner inside -- the real American thing: hotdogs, pizza and Miller beer.

The show started around 20:30 o'clock and Lenny was the first to perform. The stadium wasn't entirely full yet, and not everybody seemed to know Lenny Kravitz, but the crowd quickly warmed up. Especially after Dig In, many people were dancing. He played all the good songs -- Mama Said, Let Love Rule, Fly Away... the best known song here seemed to be American Woman. It was an excellent show, even though Lenny had his foot casted and he couldn't really move a lot on stage. We enjoyed it a lot.

When Kravitz left, it took about 30 minutes for the stage to be re-built and modified. The second show of the evening was Aerosmith. A lot of people in the audience came to see this band from the early 1970s, so there were quite a lot of older people in the crowd, and many ladies with their hair in 1980s style and men with Aerosmith T-shirts.

Even though we are not real fans of Aerosmith is was a good show to watch -- these guys have obviously been doing concerts for more than 30 years so they know what they're doing, and it was a great show. There was quite a lot of songs that we knew, and the crowd was very energetic.

It was over around midnight, so we took one of the last metro's home. It took a while to get home as we had to wait long for a transfer at Metro Center.

We were at the Madison Square Garden around 19:00 o'clock -- a bit early but we didn't want to miss anything!

We had electronic tickets that we bought back in March, so we used a printed piece of paper to get in the theater. Our seats were on the second ring, looking at the stage from the back side.

It was very nice to enter the main theater of the Madison Square Garden. We took some drinks and at 20:00 the support act started: Keane, a British band. They played a number of their hit-singles, including Somewhere Only We Know and gave a very nice performance. Their piano player was extremely energetic.

The lead singer, Tom Chaplin mentioned a number of times how happy they were to be the support-act for U2, and everytime he mentioned the name "U2" the audience started cheering.

After Keane left the stage, a large crew came on stage and moved everything around. About 10 people climbed upstairs, to the lights and cameras, and after a while they left the stage and the lights went off.

U2 came on stage! The show started with City of Blinding Lights, a song from How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, U2's latest album. It's a very powerful song and a great way to start the concert.

There were so many great songs... a lot of songs from the latest album, but also many "oldies" such as Elevation and Where The Streets Have No Name.

There were two songs that I thought stood out: Stuck In A Moment, in a beautiful acoustic performance, and Fast Cars, at the end of the concert.

Suffice it to say that it was an incredible experience and we had a great time. We were singing and dancing pretty much throughout the entire concert (so was the entire audience). The concert was over around 23:30 o'clock.

Yesterday we bought tickets for U2!

U2 will be touring around the world this summer with their Vertigo tour: they're in Amsterdam in July and in October they'll be in New York. We have two tickets for the latter. The concert will be in Madison Square Garden, a famous location for concerts, on a Friday evening.

I bought the tickets on-line, on TicketMaster.com. The sale started exactly at 9.00 o'clock. I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the buying process -- the site was very responsive, even at the most busy moment. I wanted to get four tickets, but the system only allowed two tickets per transaction and everything was sold out quickly. A couple of additional concert dates were added after 9.00 o'clock and they quickly sold out as well.

It's something really nice to look forward to, a concert by such a great band. And, very good news for the readers that don't have tickets yet: there are two additional concerts planned in New York (November 21 and 22), and the tickets for that will go on sale next Monday.

Yesterday I went out with Arjan and Irene to a play in the Toneelschuur. We had dinner in Arjan's place. I had gnocchi for the first time, a potato based pasta; very nice.

We went to "Woord", a new play by Rieks Swarte. Rieks Swarte is the brother of Joost Swarte, cartoonist and architect of the Toneelschuur building. "Woord" is about a two men who are exploring the architecture of the Cordoba temple, and a woman who is more interested in mysticism.

The play resembled a lecture at times, such as when the golden ratio was explained, but a funny one at that. The use of video camera's on stage was very nice. It was a try-out performance and one of the camera's ran out of batteries half-way.

The play was very entertaining and often funny. Afterwards we stayed in the theater's bar quite long; a great evening.

Yesterday Max and I went to a concert of Avril Lavigne, a Canadian singer and songwriter. The concert was in the Heineken Music Hall, a concert hall near the Amsterdam Arena and close to Florijn, where Sasha and I used to live. We first had dinner in a café next to the concert hall; it was very cozy. Then we went next doors, to the Music Hall.

We skipped the pre-show. It was the first time I saw the Heineken Music Hall from the inside. It's a very pleasant place: large, efficient but stylishly decorated. The hallways and entrance gave me the impression of a large cinema. The hallways were wide and high: the building could handle a lot of visitors without giving a crowded feeling. There were free internet terminals as well.

The concert was very nice. I knew only three songs, Avril's hit singles, but her repertoire was very broad and it was a good show. She has a marvelous voice. The audience was diverse, with a lot of young kids.

It was a real fun evening; I was home around midnight.

We went to see Hairspray, a Broadway musical, to celebrate Sasha's birthday. Hairspray is a new musical; it started in 2002 and it has had very good reviews.

It was a extremely entertaining and funny show, with a lot of spectacular dancing and costumes. I absolute loved Edna Turnblad, one of the two main characters. Ms. Turnblad is a house-wife turning into a TV star during the musical. Her role is played by a male actor, Harvey Fierstein, who received a Tony Award for his performance. The climax was the duet of Wilbur and Edna Turnblad: absolutely hilarious.

Yesterday I went to a theater show in the Toneelschuur. We saw The Revisor, a comedy by Nikolai Gogol. It was played by the Paardenkathedraal, a Dutch theater group that won several awards in the past.

I went there with Arjan, Karen, Jelly and Max. We first had dinner together in our place, which was nice.

I really enjoyed the show, it was funny and very professional. I had expected a more 'difficult' performance, but The Revisor is a plain comedy -- although a very good one. I loved the mayor and his wife, two main characters, and the fights that they had, especially in the second half.

The language used was really beautiful -- the texts were great. The mayor had a magnificent way of talking: screaming, whispering, all mixed with a continuous trembling of his body because of nervousness and general dissatisfaction with the world.

A smaller role that I liked was the maid of the mayor; she was really funny in her own, quiet way.

General conclusion: I liked it a lot. It wasn't highbrow theater, but very amusing.

Yesterday evening we saw Aïda -- and what a magnificient show! The voices, music, decors and actors were all great. We had a wonderful evening.


The show took about 2,5 hours and we were home around 1:30 o'clock. There is a fan website that has a very nice Flash intro that shows a few highlights of the evening.

Tonight we'll go to the musical Aïda, in the Circustheater in Scheveningen. I'm really looking forward to it.

Mieke gave us tickets for the musical (thanks a lot!). I just read the story, it's rather complicated but everybody says it's a great show.

We just saw the first part of opera by Musorgski, Boris Godoenov. After the first 20 minutes we left, it was boring... but 20 minutes were nice :)