By Diana KLOCHKO, The Day
The Spanish superstar's only concert in Kyiv took place at the Ukrayina
Palace of Culture, with the audience filled almost to capacity (as those
who managed to buy cheap sets for UAH 80-100 in the peanut gallery spotted
empty seats in the parterre (UAH 500-1,000) and quickly occupied them.
In fact, this privileged part of the audience featured not only ladies
in beautiful evening dresses and their dignified male companions but also
their offspring. Apparently, there are families in Ukraine that can afford
to pay UAH 3,000 (about $750) for a concert. But there were also children
in wheelchairs, brought on the singer's instructions (Julio Iglesias is
known for his charity and generous contributions for seriously afflicted
children wherever he performs).
His other noble gesture that night was fading into the background and
using his voice as a soft accompaniment for dancing couples showing remarkable
plasticity and fiery temperament. The two-hour concert (unfortunately delayed
for an hour while the maestro practiced and audio equipment was adjusted)
kept the audience in suspense, because Iglesias offered a program best
described as a reciprocity test. He masterfully provoked the listeners
to join him in every number, trying to tune in that band of sincere reciprocal
love for the lyrics, music, and feelings. The Kyivans preferred to clap
their hands louder and louder, whistling, laughing, shouting bravo, encoring
the singer, but few if any sang along.
The outstanding singer offered his audience not a dry academic concert
but something akin to an intimate rendezvous, a vocal dialogue with each
and every listener. Not all in the audience raised on mass-traditional
shows appeared ready to accept this approach.
Before the concert started one could hear whispered questions everywhere,
"Will it be soundtrack or live?" And the Iglesias started singing and his
bewitching range, from vague pianissimo to the tremulous upper A, almost
convinced the public it was live. There was one number, however, which
opened a wide gap between the performer and his audience: Iglesias sang
a song in memory of his parents, against a slowly lowering curtain with
a picture of postwar ramshackle streets in his native city, with old linen
hung out to dry, peeling plaster, and doors torn from their hinges. He
sang nostalgically about a childhood lost forever and the audience saw
the horrors of devastation, something they all see every day but a short
walk from that very Palace of Culture.







