Critical Concert Report: A Review of a Live Music Performance

This critical concert report reviews the 'Trio in E minor' performance attended on February 17, 2018, featuring David Finckel, Philip Setzer, and Wu Han. The report analyzes the concert's strengths, including the selection of popular songs and the vocalists' modifications to the original songs, and weaknesses, such as time management and synchronization issues among the musicians. The author reflects on the experience, highlighting aspects that could be applied to improve future performances, such as modifying existing works and improving time management skills. The report also mentions the performance by vocalists Alessandra Paonessa and Owen Pallett, and the venue, Hugh’s Room in Toronto. The author also references several academic sources related to live music performance and audience motivations.

Running head: CRITICAL CONCERT REPORT
Critical Concert Report
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Music in the Western World: Concert Review
The show that I have attended in recent times is “Trio in E minor” on 17th February,
2018. The concert was written by Dmitri Shostakovich and there are three performers in the
concert- David Finckel, Philip Setzer and Wu Han. In this report, I will critically represent my
view on the experience that I gathered from the concert and describe impressive and
unsatisfactory aspects of the concert. I will also represent an overview that I have gathered from
the observation and the process through which I can apply those factors in future to improve my
own performance.
The live concert comprised of a musical play that I personally like a lot in which the three
players played three individual instruments- piano, a cello, and a violin. The music supported the
songs of the two vocalists from Toronto- Alessandra Paonessa and Owen Pallett. The timing for
the event is from 8p.m. onwards and is a 2 hours performance. The venue for the show is
selected on Hugh’s room 2261 Dundas St, Toronto. Alessandra Paonessa is a singer from
Toronto, Canada and her firs debut music album is Remembering Heaven; on the other hand,
Michael James Owen Pallett is from Ontario, Canada and his genres are Indie pop, baroque pop,
experimental music, classical and art rock. I am a great fan of both of the vocalist and intend to
attend this concert from quite a time before.
The first thing that I liked about the “Trio in E minor” is that the selection of the songs
that the performers have selected. All the selected songs are famous and loved by all of the
audience. The famous songs that were sung in the concert are from both of their famous track
like “Ai Giochi Addio”, “Parla Piu Piano”, “Now I've Found You At Last”, “Follow Your
Dream”, “Perfect Summer Days”, “The Great Elsewhere”, “Songs for Five & Six”, “I am not
Afraid”, “On a path” and “Soldier’s Rock”. Everyone enjoys the performance and listens to the

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most loved sing live at Toronto and I find myself nodding my head and tapping my foot
rhythmically with the songs. I think that in order to attract more audience, these singers have
opted for a strung decision that is to select popular songs. Some songs have remarkable impact
on people’s mind and selecting those songs helps in generating nostalgic feeling, which
automatically drive the good feeling among the audience.
Another aspect that I liked is variation in tone and ways of singing compared to the
original songs. I found this factor most interesting because the performers modified their tone
and added extra effort to make the song more presentable to the audience. I have enjoyed this
thing because it offers the musician to continuously improve their performance and ability. All
the supporting musicians also supported these two superstar vocalists effectively by not making
any mistakes.
The aspects I do not like about this performance is the time management of the live
concert. The performers did not introduce the piece they were going to sing and the musicians
also did not tune their instruments due to which they need more time to prepare themselves on
the stage. It has taken longer than 15 minutes to start the event and the interval break is greater
than desired time. The show was undoubtedly a successful event but the inconvenience occurred
to the audience results in early departure of some audience, who live to distant place. This
furthermore resulted in distraction in between the event, when the vocalists are still performing.
Moreover, the performers did not verbally communicate to each other due to which the
synchronization problem must arise. Some of the musicians forgot some beats that hampered the
performance of the concert. The thing that I noticed is that those musicians might have lack of
practice or are new in the orchestra. These musicians never observed or inquired of each other
and decide about the next piece of the music concert.

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I liked the factors of making modification in the original songs by adding some new
tunes, changing the way of singing in order to develop the things. I can implement this thing not
only in performance as an artist but also in daily life. This aspect will encourage me to
accomplish all my desired tasks in a more suitable way. However, I have to learn that the
modification must have to be good to ears and the audience must like the song. I can check the
progress of the modification of the work by rehearsing or practicing regularly. I can also test the
outcome of the progress by asking some people o give feedback on my performance.
I have also planned to start all my work in time so that I can plan effectively for
completing all the desired work. This will help me to attend all the works that I am supposed to
accomplish. I have to listed down all the necessary works and then divide the time. This will
improve my sense of prioritizing the work and time management. The cross-checking of all the
works from the lists also ensure that I have fulfilled all the works.
In this business report I have identified two good aspects of the show are selection of the
songs and the modification in the singing procedure of the original singing. I like these two
aspects as it attracts more audience till the end of the concert. However, the different aspects that
I did not like are time management of the live concert and the incapability of some of the new
members, who faced synchronization problem with the experienced musicians. I have also
identified that the modification in the original works and maintaining time are the two aspects
that I would like to incorporate for improving my future performance.

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Reference List
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live music (2015): 3-15.
Brown, Steven Caldwell, and Don Knox. "Why go to pop concerts? The motivations behind live
music attendance." Musicae Scientiae 21.3 (2017): 233-249
Chan, Wing-Yi, Huamin Qu, and Wai-Ho Mak. "Visualizing the semantic structure in classical
music works." IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics 16.1 (2010):
161-173.
Dogantan-Dack, Mine. "The art of research in live music performance." Music Performance
Research 5 (2012): 34-48.
Heaton, Roger. "Contemporary performance practice and tradition." Music Performance
Research 5.Spec (2012): 96-104.
Ng, Yee Von. The Collaborative Pianist's Role In An Integrated-Arts Setting: Dance, Music, and
Visual Arts. Diss. 2014.