Indigo Girls @ Kleinhans Music Hall, Buffalo, New York 9-28-12

The “encore” developed as a spontaneous recognition of a remarkable performance and in recent years has become a contrived and scripted part of a performance. After the Indigo Girls finished their stellar performance with The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, and perhaps unbeknownst to them, most of the crowd stayed in place screaming and yearning for just one more song.

The exercise of screaming for an encore has become so scripted that I am sure anyone who attends shows with any sort of regularity has been to a concert where a band reappears for the last song even when the crowd is barely audible.

While The Indigo Girls didn’t come back onstage, the crowd’s genuine enthusiasm underscores the kind of performance that the Indigo Girls and the BPO put on. It was so good I am almost at a loss for words, and those people that know me will confirm that does not happen often.

One might write of these symphony shows that marry rock and pop stars with orchestras as some kind of gimmick, but when done right it is truly awe-inspiring. On this night, Amy Ray quipped she never imagined she would be playing with “such a great band.” In many ways that summed it up, the BPO was not just a pile of violins and other instruments laying down a soundtrack or providing a backdrop, they were an integral part of the performance. Moreover, if there was anyone in the crowd that questioned the value of a great orchestra to a community, those questions were laid to rest. Buffalo has every right to be proud of the symphony that bears its name.

What may have been surprising to the casual observer was how these two women with acoustic guitars could write music so well suited for an orchestra, especially considering the duo is sometimes marginalized as a “folk duo.” In that respect, folk music performed with an orchestra may be just as sacrilegious as Dylan plugging in at Newport all those years ago. It was not sacrilegious though, if anything it was akin to a religious experience, with surreal moments like the beautiful version of “Ghost,” near the end of the show.

There were so many musical highlights it’s difficult to pick out just a few. The set was constructed perfectly, with Ray and Sailer’s alternating songs and each set built to its perfect climax. For the first set, the trio of “Power of Two,” “Chickenman” and “Galileo” sent the crowd into a near frenzy. Ray joked before the band left for the intermission that she had friends that left a previous show thinking it was over.

The first set was so good you would have already had your money’s worth, and I honestly thought they would have a hard time topping it. I was wrong, very wrong!

The second set proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the marriage of their music and an orchestra was a match made in heaven. And while I cannot compare the BPO’s performance with others the duo has performed with, I would guess they were one of the best orchestras they performed with during this maiden run of orchestra shows.

The second set ended much like the first, but with even more intensity. The crowd began giving the performers a standing ovation at the end of every song before the set was over and was standing and applauding before “Kid Fears” ended. For “Closer to Fine,” the entire crowd was standing from beginning to end, leading into raucous applause at the end of the show, begging for the encore that never materialized.

There is one other observation I had that evening. Not only was the audience incredibly enthusiastic, they were the best sounding crowd I have ever heard. One of my pet peeves at shows is when artists relinquish verses or choruses to the audience. Most of the time it sounds like a chorus of drunken sailors on leave, and yet this crowd sounded like an actual choir when they sang. For lack of a better description, it was really cool.

Set List:

Love of our Lives
Sugar Tongue
Feed and Water the Horses
Compromise
Wood Song
Yoke
Power of Two
Chickenman
Galileo