I like Il Divo. I like any many who can hold a tune to be honest. The way to a man's heart may be through his stomach but the way to mine is definitely through a beautifully rendered song. I signed the Marriage Register to the sounds of Il Divo singing Unbreak My Heart and we all know how that ended so perhaps I should have stayed well away but anyway, ticket in my hot little hand, I sprinted up the steps to the Circle, arriving half way through the first song so I had to wait at the entrance until there was a suitable break in the music.
The sound was amazing. You know that expression? A wall of sound. That was what it was. I could feel it in my kidneys.
It wasn't until I was shown to my seat that I became aware that I was definitely one of the younger members of the audience. I was surrounded by a sea of grey heads interspersed with bald ones - those being the long suffering husbands who had been dragged along, clearly under duress from the body language of a few. I've never been to concert where there were so many walking sticks!
By the third song I realised that an evening with Il Divo was not going to be exactly what I thought. I don't suppose I have ever really thought about the demographics of their fans, there being far more important issues to ponder, generally speaking. The fact that that I bought my mother one of their CDs for her birthday should probably have been a little pointer.
The audience were, by and large, femmes d'un certain age who, for one night only, were transported back to their young, horny youth. By the third song I realised that these guys could fart in a bathtub and get a standing ovation.
The evening was rife with sexual innuendo of the sort that made women of their generation giggle like school girls and women of mine cringe ever so slightly. Carlos, the Spanish one with the fabulous voice, seemed to spend much of the evening talking about 'making lurve' to these beautiful women. I only hope he wasn't around when the house lights went up!
Still, in the more upbeat numbers, it was good to see the 'femmes' cast off their walking sticks, like Lazarus rising from the dead, and shake their booty in the aisles. Go girls!
The music was amazing and had the added bonus of Lea Salonga, who I first saw in Miss Saigon when dinosaurs still walked the earth. Anyone who has seen Les Mis will probably have seen Lea as she has played both Eponine and Fantine. She's also teeny tiny but with a voice that could take the roof off.
What was quite nice to see was the lack of phones held in the air to film the concert. Clearly this sort of this was Not Acceptable judging from the glares I got from the lady next to me any time I tried, hence the rather fuzzy photo. However, at the intermission I was very impressed at the number who whipped out their phones and posted status updates on Facebook.
Whatever you feel about Il Divo, you can't ignore the fact that their harmonies are beautiful, making the hair on the back of your neck stand up and I'll be honest and say there were a few teary moments for me but for me the beauty of the evening was watching all these 'laydees' behaving really rather badly. I never expected to find myself in a situation where women only slightly younger than my mother were shouting out some really quite bawdy stuff to some hot young men. I'm sure when they started out they had visions of young women mobbing them at the stage door. I think a day in the life of an Il Divo groupie is more likely to involve a trip to the arthritis clinic than hot sex in a hotel room - although I think a few of them would have happily given it a go, pacemakers and artificial hips permitting.
As a lesson it growing old disgracefully, it was spot on. Femmes d'un certain age, I take my hat off to you!
