It was the Hits Deep tour, which literally meant that all the artists he had with him were not only his "wish list" tour artists (and all said yes), but they played all hits! Capital Kings (whom I'd never heard), Ryan Stevenson (I also didn't know), Matthew West, Matt Maher, Mandisa and Brandon Heath were all there - and they were all incredible! Not only was Toby Mac's band "Diverse City" there, but they backed up every single artist.
It. Was. Awesome.
We saw Aidan, one of our Trek students there with his mom! It was Aidan's first concert, and he was a little nervous. Halfway through, we turned around to see both he and his mom totally rocking out! We thought he had a pretty good time, judging by the smile on his face!
While I absolutely love music - playing it, writing it, performing it, listening to it - I didn't imagine that my life would be changed by this one concert. I'm not really talking about spiritually (sorry!), but I suppose that was part of it.
What I'm talking about is that I had a renewed love of music. I haven't had that in a very long time. It was just one of those special moments where I went, "I want to do this. I want to make music. I want to share music. I want to live music."
It started with a "meet Brandon Heath" incentive where you buy his latest CD "Blue Mountain," and you get an acoustic sessions CD as well as a meet and greet. (We didn't get to meet him. Security cut the line off about 30 people ahead of us. I was really, really sad!) So anyway, I bought the CD.
Since then, two things have happened every single day in my life:
I've woken up.
I've listened to this CD.
No joke. It's amazing. It's folk, country, modern, celtic, eerie, haunting, lovely, deep and amazing. If you haven't heard it, listen to it. Now. The song, "Dyin' Day," broke my heart. It's about a man on death row in prison. The entire song is just literally haunting. I would go into more details here, but I just can't. Talk to me in person or something, if you want the full story on this song.
I also have become totally enthralled with learning the music on the album again. I actually got my guitar out again last week and started playing. I played guitar in church last week - if you were there, don't get used to it, lol. I'll leave the guitar skills to the experts, and stick to what I know (piano, vocals, violin, flute). Although I am very grateful for those of you who have approached me and said that you loved the song I chose, and the way that I played it. I cannot take credit alone - Paul and Kelton were very helpful! Currently, I know how to play piano, flute, clarinet, alto sax, guitar, violin, and drums. I'm not great at all of it, but I love to practice and improve. Practice makes progress! I was so inspired by all of the artists at this concert! (And, to my band - you're about to be inspired, because the entire song list we've got for this summer was from this concert, haha!)
Anyway, here are some pictures from that concert! We had the worst seats in the house (well, maybe not the worst... those were only 4 rows above us!), and paid a small fortune for them, but you'd never know it from the pictures! I love my 75-300 lens!
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| Capital Kings |
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| They had a lot of electronic music! |
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| Ryan Stevenson |
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| Matt Maher! |
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| Matt Maher and Brandon Heath! |
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| Brandon Heath singing "Jesus in Disguise" (this is now on the list for Shepherd's Praise this summer - yup, my band is going to play it!) |
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| "You are looking for a king you would never recognize..." |
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| I can't remember which song he did with Mandisa, but it sounded so cool! |
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| They really had amazing harmonies! |
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| Acoustic and awesome! |
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| Mandisa. That girl moves. I swear she did an entire Zumba workout while she was performing! |
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| I actually missed this next part, and Robert tried to keep up with pictures for me. I was walking the entire perimeter of the Key Arena venue to find the Brandon Heath stand (and then all the way back again), only to find out that the section I needed was literally one over from the one we were in. Sigh. |
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| Matthew West! |
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| Blurry, but rocking out! |
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| Hehe. I included this one only because it made me giggle! |
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| Toby Mac & Diverse City! |
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| His band was amazing! They had so much stamina! |
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| Getting loud! |
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| Toby. Dude cuts rugs like nobody's business. |
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| Everyone was into it! |
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| They were great! |
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| Drum solo! |
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| A SECOND stage!!!! |
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| ...a second stage WITH MATT MAHER! AHHH!! |
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| Toby & Matt duet. Musical genius. |
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| Mandisa joins Toby! |
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| Mandisa hugs Toby! |
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| Toby and his band kept going! |
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| See the guy in the green cargo pants? He played 7 different instruments on stage. I counted. I told Robert, "He plays a bunch of instruments like I do!" He said, "Yes, but he plays brass." To which I stared at him blankly and then said, "I want to learn trumpet!" LOL |
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| I loved the bright colored clothes. Made it easier to keep track of 'em! They were everywhere, haha! |
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| Moving!!! |
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| Brass trio! |
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| And just when we thought it couldn't get any better...Toby busted out of his jacket to reveal.... his 12th man jersey. |
Well done, Toby; well done. Seattle was thrilled to have you!
At one point, Toby said, "You all know my wife. She's a Jamaican woman, and she can be....well, scary. Sometimes, things don't always go well. Sometimes, we argue and fight. We go to separate ends of the house. And you know what? She is always the first one to come crawling back to me! She finds me in the bedroom and gets down on her knees and says, 'TOBY! GET OUT FROM UNDER THE BED AND FIGHT LIKE A MAN!'" AHAHAHAAHHAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAHA! I seriously laughed so hard, my sides hurt! He then introduced the song, "Hold On," which he wrote for his wife. Aww!
I love how all of the artists that were there were so real. It's what made the concert so great!
I'll try to get part 2 blogged later this week, but for now, I'll say this: We had an amazing night out on the town after the concert, too! Pictures to come of our downtown adventures!
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