At the Accor Arena in Paris, Madonna goes from liveliness to boredom

2023-11-13 05:36:56
Madonna, during the opening night of the Celebration Tour at the O2 Arena in London, October 14, 2023. KEVIN MAZUR / WIRELMAGE FOR LIVE NATION

Scheduled to begin in mid-July and until October, the North American leg of Madonna’s Celebration Tour was postponed due to the American singer’s health problems. And so it was with the dates planned in Europe that this international tour began. That of October 14, at the O2 Arena in London was the first.

With this show, it is not for the artist to accompany a new album but rather to evoke a career spanning forty years, the first opus of Madonna Louise Ciccone having been published in July 1983.

Sunday November 12, at the Accor Arena, was the first of four evenings of the Paris leg of a European visit which will end in early December. The venue’s website mentions a few places still on sale, for November 13, 19 and 20, between 194 euros and 386.50 euros depending on the category.

Read also: Should you still go see Madonna in concert?

Nearly an hour and forty minutes late from the announced time, due to technical problems – the audience followed the pulling of cables and mini-projectors towards high supports – the concert began with the arrival of a revue leader in a grand-century Marie-Antoinette costume – he will appear in other attire at several points later – who raises the mood while images of Madonna from different periods were projected. Which, in the smoke, appears on the circular part of the stage apparatus which extends partly into the pit, in a large black dress, to Nothing Really Mattersa title from 1998.

Pre-recorded tapes

Apart from three or four moments where a pianist intervenes – Mercy James, one of Madonna’s daughters, during Bad Girl – an acoustic guitarist – one of her sons, David Banda –, a cellist, it is on pre-recorded tapes that Madonna sings. In the absence of musicians on stage, there are people for the choreographies, around twenty dancers in all. Here they are, in punk for Everybody et Into The Groove.

This return to her early years, which she will evoke during a speech, is followed by Burning Upin a rock treatment, Open Your Heart, Holiday, amusing sequence where Madonna is turned away from the entrance to a nightclub while her comrades enter without problem. A disco ball adds to the joyful aspect of this suite of pop songs from the 1980s. Striking contrast and strong idea of ​​the show, follows the song Live To Tell, taken from the album True Blue in 1986. In a basket, Madonna crosses the heights of the room while on screens are projected black and white photographs of personalities close to the singer, then hundreds of faces of anonymous people, all dead of AIDS.

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