Tampa, USA jan 28th

Posted January 29, 200916 yr

Dion Doesn't Rest On Her Laurels For Show

By CURTIS ROSS

Published: January 29, 2009

•TAMPA - Celine Dion's stage sat in the center of the Forum floor Wednesday night like a boxing ring. She entered the arena, in fact, surrounded by an entourage, not unlike a fighter about to enter the ring.

Performing in the same venue in 1997, she performed like a hungry challenger. Despite being at perhaps her peak of commercial success, she seemed determine to win over an already won-over crowd.

Wednesday night, before a crowd of 18,550, Dion wore the superstar mantle with ease, knowing the crowd was in her pocket before the house lights dimmed.

Of course she still worked her French-Canadian tail off. It's her way.

The staging did an admirable job of bringing the show to the cheap seats. A frenetic light show, dancers and non-stop video imagery kept things popping.

It wasn't exactly subtle, but subtlety wasn't really on the bill. Dion specializes in big - big ballads, big gestures, big productions.

Besides, with a voice that big, why caress a lyric when you can wrap it in a bear hug?

What saved the show from overkill was Dion herself. She may ooze the same show-biz sincerity as any other performer, but she's more self-effacing, more willing to laugh at herself, a welcome breather between melodramatic ballads.

When a fan on the floor handed her a copy of her first album to sign, she reacted like any other adult being surprised with a photo of themselves as a teen. Well, actually a lot more graciously than that. But the look on her face was priceless.

Dion has grown sleeker and sexier as well, dancing and twirling with drill team precision clad in slinky mini-dresses and stiletto heels. And in the end, that was as important as anything she sang. The show was more a celebration of Dion's celebrity than a concert. But at least Dion remembers to take her fans along for the ride.

Celine Dion a diva, loud and proud
By John Fleming, Times Performing Arts Critic
In Print: Thursday, January 29, 2009

TAMPA — Celine Dion is not the vulnerable type. When she launches into a supposedly sensitive song like All By Myself, she approaches it with all the subtlety of a runaway beer truck, squinting her eyes shut as she holds a high note at an ear-piercing volume. But there's still something endearing about the French-Canadian diva, and it probably has to do with her weirdly awkward stage persona, all those chest-thumping, fist-pumping, finger-pointing, air guitar-strumming gestures that keep comedians in business. Dion's fans love her dorkiness.

She brought her Taking Chances tour to the St. Pete Times Forum on Wednesday night, kicking things off by climbing on top of a piano to belt out I Drove All Night, the old Cyndi Lauper (and Roy Orbison) hit, to a thudding dance beat.

As a piece of theater, the show is state of the art arena pop, directed by Jamie King, also responsible for staging tours of Madonna, Britney Spears and Avril Lavigne. Dion performs in the round from a vast square stage, with three backup singers and a seven-piece band. There are video screens everywhere, including a large cubic screen hung over the stage that dominates the production. From time to time, the singer would stride up a catwalk that extended into the audience to be bathed in light from all the flash cameras.

Dion, who turns 41 in March, has eight dancers, and they would come on to give her a chance to make a costume changes. The most effective was when the dancers did a flamenco number, then Dion emerged on an elevator from a hole at center stage to sing Eyes on Me in an outfit with a long white train, billowing behind her like a parachute. In a "fashion victim" segment, she sported a black and silver bell-bottomed Abba-style getup for Shadow of Love.

Dion's tour has been going on for a year, and was the second-best-selling show in 2008 with sales of $237 million, ranking behind another stainless steel diva, Madonna. The St. Pete Times Forum was virtually full Wednesday, with attendance of 18,550.

She was bubbling with homey stage patter, chatting about the Super Bowl, having her 81-year-old mother on the tour and how great the audience was. "I'm a talker, I can't help it," she said.

Basically, the tour is a blown-up version of Dion's Las Vegas show, which closed an almost five-year run in 2007. There are a half-dozen songs from the Taking Chances album, and a healthy selection of the greatest hits, all sounding the same after a while. She did some oddball covers, like James Brown's It's a Man's Man's Man's World, Aretha Franklin's Respect and Ike and Tina Turner's River Deep, Mountain High. Soulful, Dion is not.

Naturally, the finale included clips from Titanic, with candelabra descending from the lighting rig, the tune of an Irish pennywhistle and the inevitable My Heart Will Go On.