This might have to be my 5th as well.
Or maybe an original Greek play like Oedipus Rex.
ETA: Since I’m limited to 5, it would be the performance of Oedipus Rex at Dionysia
Why would I ruin the artistic performance?
I was sticking to concerts, but I see folks are chiming in with stage performances as well, so here’s my addendum:
- Opening night of We Will Rock You at the Dominion in London, 2002
- The Rocky Horror Show in London, 1973
- Any of the Comic Strip performances at The Comedy Store, late 70s/early 80s
- Glengarry Glen Ross on Broadway, with Joe Mantegna as Ricky Roma, 1984
- Titus Andronicus, original run.
Manchester Lesser Free Trade Hall, June 4, 1976.
Premier of Metropolis
Premier of A Midsummer Night’s Dream at … whatever event that was
A show at the Moulin Rouge sometime in the 1890s, on a night when at least Toulouse-Lautrec is present.
Does all of Woodstock count as “a concert”?
Mine are mostly rock concerts.
- Live Aid, at Wembley Stadium in London, July 13, 1985.
- Winter Party Dance Tour, Clear Lake, Iowa, February 2, 1959. This was the concert which occurred immediately before the plane crash which killed Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and the Big Bopper.
- Electric Light Orchestra, Wembley, June 2, 1978. This was the first show in the “Out of the Blue” tour where they used the massive “flying saucer” stage set.
- Queen, Montreal, November 24 or 25, 1981. Freddie and the band at the height of their powers.
- Wicked, with the original cast (including Kristin Chenoweth, Idina Menzel, and Joel Grey), Broadway, late 2003.
Absolutely.
Just take half-a-tab
Niccolò Paganini live in concert.
Franz Liszt live in concert.
A Harry Houdini magic show.
Follies in its original Broadway run.
The Isle of Dogs at the Swan Theatre, 1597.
- Bill Evans Trio at the Village Vanguard, Sunday, June 25, 1961.
- tbd
- tbd
- tbd
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The opening performance of The Nutcracker in Saint Petersburg in December of 1892. It was a double performance with Tchaikovsky’s final opera, Lolanta.
Another one who would see the Beatles at the Cavern Club.
Woodstock. The whole damn thing.
The Monterey Pop Festival, specifically the Saturday, June 17 performance with Big Brother and the Holding Co. featuring Janis Joplin. But really, the whole damn thing as well.
Hmmm… I guess I’d choose a Shakespeare play, performed in his time with Shakespeare himself in attendance. King Lear would be a good choice, although I have a particular fondness for Cymbeline as well.
Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival 1965 (first going electric on stage)
Bob Dylan and the Hawks (later the Band) 1966 in the Manchester Free Trade Hall (the “Royal Albert Hall Concert”, with the “Judas!” incident)
The Who at Leeds 1969 (as recorded for “Live At Leeds”)
Nirvana at the Reading Festival 1992
Nirvana unplugged in New York 1993
Nitpick: that was in Hamburg, the Kaiserkeller was one of the Hamburg clubs they played between 1960 and 1962 (others were the Star Club, the most famous, and the Indra). AFAIK, they never played in Berlin.
ETA: if I have my Beatles history down, after 1962 they only returned once to Germany for the 1966 Bravo Blitztour. They played Essen, Munich and Hamburg, but not Berlin.
Billie Holiday
Charlie Parker
John Coltrane (pre Pharaoh Sanders)
Robert Johnson
James Brown
- Lincoln’s Lost Speech (apparently a speech so amazing the reporters were mesmerized and didn’t record it).
- Woodstock (cuz…Woodstock)
- Talking Heads at CBGB (mentioned above)
- Live Aid at Wembley stadium (with near front row “seats”)
- Altamont Free Concert (assuming I didn’t get hurt)
Take a look at this picture:
See those little white vertical things standing on the field? Those are the Electro-Voice LR4 speakers that were supposed to cover Shea Stadium’s 55,000+ seats.
…an array of Electro-Voice LR4 column speakers were set up on the field surrounding the stage, blasting the sound out to the huge audience of more than 55,000 people. What is true though, is that this was hardly sufficient for an audience this size, and especially since Beatles audiences tended to scream from the top of their lungs all through their concerts. So most people didn’t hear anything at all from the concert. And since this was the very first pop concert taking place in a stadium, it was a learning experience for all involved.
Cite. [Emphasis mine.]
Thirty or forty years ago I used to do sound for bands, but I have no idea how much power or how many speakers a sound company would provide for a venue that size today. But I’ll wager good money that it would be hundreds of times more than was used in August 1965.
Here’s a picture that gives a better idea of the scale of the stadium:
IIRC, that was the first time there had ever been a concert in a baseball stadium. No one had any clue what equipment would be needed.
One of the first, certainly, and even if they had known, the equipment just didn’t exist. I’d guess that each of those roughly 40 Electro-Voice towers might have been powered by a 100-watt amp. If that.
Today they would use thousands of watts of amplifier power and huge arrays of speakers throughout the stadium, like the ones below. (Note the person standing on the stage at the lower left, for scale.) Each of those four towers may need amps producing 25,000 watts or more, and you’d need multiple towers like that to fill Shea. (Extrapolating from my possibly out-of-date experience as an occasional audio engineer decades ago.)
- Eric Clapton & the Palpitations (Pete Townshend, Ronnie Wood, Rick Grech, Jim Capaldi, Steve Winwood, &c.) at the Rainbow, 1973
- The Who, Live at Leeds, 1970
- An opening day screening of Star Wars, May 25 1977
- Nirvana, Dorm K208, The Evergreen State College, 1988
- WCW Bash at the Beach 1996 (the night Hulk Hogan turned heel)
I was at TESC in 1988. Somehow I didn’t hear about that. Depending on the night, it’s likely I was within a hundred yards or so.
Our American Cousin, Ford Theater. April 1865
Any performance of Henry V at the Globe Theatre.
Unknown play my grandmother mentioned, a performance at their country school, in which she saw the young man who would become my grandfather three years later. She said he was wearing real English style riding boots, and looked so romantic.
Jimi Hendrix playing the national anthem at Woodstock. I was alive then but too young to go.
To be in the live audience when Steve Martin did King Tut on SNL. Alive then too.