Mandy Patinkin Tarrytown Music Hall 3/30/13

I went to hear Mandy Patinkin, because I am a Grobanite and Josh keeps mentioning Mandy.  First, Josh mentioned him as the kind of performer that Josh aspired to be before he met David Foster.  Second, Josh has mentioned Mandy as a potential running mate for the 2016 presidential campaign, when Josh will be 35 and therefore old enough to be President.

The Tarrytown Music Hall is an old theater that was first a Music Hall, then a movie theater, and now a Music Hall again.  It's in need of repairs, but the community is working on it.  It's a community project to maintain and renovate it.   I don't know exactly how many people it seats -- maybe 300?  maybe 500? I'm not sure.  It's got great acoustics.

I am grateful to say that this concert was not overamplified, unlike the Chris Botti concert I heard in the same hall a few weeks back.

It was just Mandy and a piano, very simple, very effective.

Mandy has great stage presence, great timing, a masterful command of his material and a powerful, beautiful, expressive voice.  He held our attention well and performed for at least 90 minutes, with no teleprompter, no intermission, 2 encores, and only a few errors in lyrics, which he handled with poise and humor.  He is still high energy and handsome, with a strong, square jaw.  He does not go in for toupees or  hair dye.  His hair is gray and receding, but he does not try to hide it.   He stays natural and simple, which I prefer.   I had my binoculars with me, so I could focus in on his face.  He was not wearing any visible makeup.

His high notes are still great.  His lower notes, unfortunately, have become quite tremulous to the point where the pitch of the notes was hard to discern, which was probably the only bad thing about this concert.  He was still fun to listen to, though, and he struck me as very genuine, the real deal.

I was impressed when he talked about his upcoming 35th anniversary of meeting his wife.  They're still married and going strong.  That's very cool.  

The acoustics were so great, and the audience was so hushed, that every little audience noise was audible everywhere, which was a bit frustrating, but, still, on the whole, I prefer a quieter concert, where I was not in the least tempted to put in ear plugs.

There was a program, but, unfortunately, it did not list what songs were being sung.  Clearly other people in the audience recognized these songs, but I did not.  Therefore I cannot look them up and figure them out, which I would like to be able to do.  I got the feeling that Mandy changed the program some as they went along.  Fortunately the pianist was up to the changes and kept up beautifully.

I went to wait for him by the stage door.  Some people got pictures, but he left before I could get one.

I did get to shout after him, though, my question, which was whether he had heard that Josh Groban was planning to run for President with him in 2016.  He shouted back "Yeah, we'll be great," with sarcasm.  

Clearly he does not believe that this is a real campaign or that there is any chance that they will be elected.

I believe that Josh also thinks that this campaign is a joke.

It is certainly the case that entertainers have conducted joke campaigns for president in the past.  I seem to recall that comedian Pat Paulsen did that when I was a kid.  So far, no joke campaigns for US President have resulted in the joke candidates actually being elected.  

Probably the same will be true of the present campaign, I suppose.

But I have this funny feeling about it.  People could write them in.  It could happen.   You never know.

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Addendum:

I'm going through YouTube videos to hear how Mandy used to sound.  Apparently, he used to sing in a higher register most of the time in the past.  In this concert, much more of what he sang was lower.

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2nd Addendum:

He ended the concert with "My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."