I attended this event at the City Center movie theater in White Plains, NY. Not more than about 10 people there-- at least 4 of whom I knew
There were some inauspicious events linked with this venue.
Two weeks before there was a big article in the local newspaper about how this venue had bed bugs, lice, and mice. A citation was issued by the City of White Plains against the venue, which was later lifted when an independent inspection failed to reveal the alleged vermin.
Still, I think many people in the area were nervous about going there, and may have chosen to go to the event in New Rochelle instead.
Then this afternoon a severe weather alert was issued for the area, with forecasts of 2-4 inches of snow -- sometimes heavy enough to impede visibility -- for the time of the event. This may have discouraged others from going.
So far the snow has not materialized.
But it was an odd event. I guess it was timed to celebrate the issuance of the DVD tomorrow -- but, for those of us who were enough clued in to know that the fathom event was even happening, that DVD had been already readily available for order from PBS for several months. I certainly already had it.
I had understood that there were going to be some extra songs not on the DVD -- if there were they were played before the start time of the event as printed on my ticket. It was distressing to walk in, thinking I was on time, to see that material was already airing, though it seemed to be taking, not music.
So far as I could tell, the musical part of the show was the same as my DVD -- tho clearly my home theater setup is rather modest compared with a movie theater. I did splurge on good, BOSE speakers, tho, so I do hear fairly well at home.
His singing was near flawless. We just have to keep thanking Kristin Blodgett for her good work in retraining his singing style. It's just so much better, not that it was bad before, of course, but it's definitely much better.
I really liked the stage setup for this concert. It had a feeling like an elegant living room, rather than a stage.
I find bizarre that they pump fog over the stage during music concerts. In this case, I don't think it had the desired effect, because some of the cameras were too far away from the stage, so it just looked like there was smoke on stage. I kept fearing that the singers would start coughing. If the camera angles were better, i.e. all closer, it might create a better illusion that the singers were actually singing in the fog -- but I wonder why the powers that be think that it would be a good idea for the singers to be surrounded by fog.
Josh introduced the British pianist/producer Bernie Herms several times -- but never introduced the Native American pianist, Mark Stevens -- why? Herms is very sexy.
They did have a Q&A with Josh, which went fairly well. One of my friends, was thrilled to hear her question answered. I think I got my question in too late, not that he would have answered it anyway, necessarily. I'll have to tweet it to him.
After the Q&A was over, they did not turn on the lights, and we got a Tom Jones concert that said "test material." I waited after everyone else had left, because I thought I understood there was going to be more Josh music, but I guess not.
There were some technical difficulties during the transmission. The signal was interrupted once during the concert and 4 times during the live Q&A.
During the Q&A, Josh apparently believed that his mike was not working. I'm not sure why he thought so, as I could hear him fine, but maybe the mike he was using was just not connected to the speakers in the same theater where he was sitting. Maybe that was intended to prevent feedback??
He kept asking whether we could hear him. We shouted back "yes," but that was not transmitted to him. He borrowed the other fellow's mike. I tweeted to Josh that both mikes were live, as that's the only way I have to reach him directly -- though I know that he couldn't be reading twitter at the moment of being interviewed. I hoped there might be some assistant reading it, who could forward anything important.
I notice that Josh seemed to be making an effort to use a lower speaking voice. This seemed make him get hoarse, so far as I can tell. Unfortunately, his past tendency to speak in a high, nervous voice, during interviews probably led at least one fan to become obsessed with the idea that he's gay. I hope that this type of bizarre obsession is not leading him to strain his speaking voice lower.
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Addenda
One fan pointed out that this fathom event was held exactly 3 years after the Allen Room Fathom event with respect to the release of the All that Echoes album. There was a critical difference between that event and this one, though. That was an actual live concert announcing a new album, that was broadcast live into theaters. This was a concert that had already been broadcast on PBS and the DVD had already been sold through PBS. It seems to me that this situation makes less sense for a Fathom event than the prior situation.
Also there was this bizarre incident where someone was talking back stage during the Q&A, which made it hard to hear. Josh fortunately noticed and called it out and it stopped -- but, really, during an event broadcast like this you would think they would be a bit more professional.
