Ben Folds at the Opera House

I saw him perform with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra last week. It was the first time I had ever seen a singer/songwriter perform with a full-on orchestra backing them, so I was eagerly anticipating this gig. Plus the fact that the venue was the Sydney Opera House, in the Concert Hall. The last time I was there was to see Jewel perform in 2004 (I think) with her "0304" album and before that in 1980something when I sang in the school choir possibly for the Queen but let's not go there....

Ben's piano songs seemed to be well-suited to the big (and small) sounds of a full orchestra so it was a really good night. I had organised our seats (Anna and Kylie were my faghags that night) up in the boxes on the left-hand side. Days earlier I started to get worried that Ben's back might be facing us if the piano was placed the "wrong way", but the work experience guy pointed out that that might not be a bad thing, as we would get to see his hands at work. Which is how it ended up, but that was ok with me because he was fantastic to watch from behind (that sounds bad).

We got to see Ben's hands as he played the piano, and it was pretty cool to watch! He's also got this funny way of half sitting, half-standing up off his stool as he plays. Rockstar that he is, he came out dressed in black jeans and t-shirt which was a contrast to the formal wear of the orchestra members.

Onto the songs, he delivered many classics from Ben Folds Five including "One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces", "Steven's Last Night in Town" and "Brick" which became this sprawling, emotional, chunky sounding orchestral piece. It was wonderful. If I was more attuned to musical genres I could describe how many of the original pieces were transformed into bigger different songs. But I'm an idiot so I can't.

He also played many songs from his recent solo career, having split from Ben Folds Five.

Highlights for me were the songs about his family (2 songs dedicated to his twins - one for his son (I forget the name) and a second for his daughter Gracie which appears on "Songs for Silverman") Both songs were delivered with what felt like to me real emotion, which appeared again when he sang "The Luckiest", a song written for his wife Frally who is an Adelaide girl he married in the 90s. Lucky Biatch. His voice quavered in all 3 songs at the start, eventually hitting the notes. Perhaps it was best then, that he did not perform "Late", a song he wrote for the recently departed Eliot Smith, whom Ben toured with. I was hoping he would sing it with the orchestra (it's one of my favourite tracks on "Songs for Silverman"), but probably best that he didn't. Someone would have had to pick me up off the floor I imagine.

Throughout the 2 hour performance, he peppered the songs with witty anecdotes about his life and his music career (boo to Sony), even recalling his infamous stoush with Geoff Harvey from the Midday Show in the early 90s when he was in Ben Folds Five. I remember the Chair-Throwing Incident because I was at home that day, waiting for afternoon uni classes to begin. One of the funniest things I've ever seen on daytime TV aside from "Passions".

But get this. The encore consisted of Ben composing an orchestral score for one of his songs ("Rock This Bitch") after he asked the audience to chat amongst themselves! He then proceeded to conduct the various sections, beginning with the cellos and double bases, moving onto the violins, percussion, wind instruments etc etc to build up this totally improvised orchestral piece to the song. How the hell they did this is beyond me!!! It was amazing! What talent!!! Kylie, who's also a singer/songwriter, whispered to me that not many orchestras in the world could do that! Totally impromptu!!!! OMG.

So a very good night it was, and to top it off I saw Pat Rafter among the crowd :)