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TheMotownManiac
06-18-2018, 08:48 PM
It’s funny, but to the oldsters at her shows, Supremes tunes seem a cherished must-have, yet the younger fans often comment she needn’t do as many or any. Personally, I love them, but mingling with fans half my age, I often hear an apathy toward The Supremes songs. Now, Variety is saying it from a fairly spot-On reviewer with one glowing error.

So so does anyone care to chime in : gas Ross’ solo career so far eclipsed her Supremes’ hits as to make them unwanted????

marybrewster
06-18-2018, 09:04 PM
I think you can look at it two ways:

With the Supremes, she amassed 23 Top 10 hits; 12 #1's.

As a solo artist, she amassed 12 Top 10 hits; 6 #1's.

Clearly as a Supreme, she had more hits.

However, her tenure with the Supremes was only 10 years. Her solo hit making years is double that. Take into account her solo career period is almost 50 years.

So while she'll always be remembered as being a Supreme, her trio days are basically 1/5 of her entire career.

marybrewster
06-18-2018, 09:08 PM
I also think the average Diana concert goer has seen her at least once prior. I'd bet it's more like multiple times. I saw her twice within the last year or so. Both times it was basically the same show. So my guess? She's switching things up for the fans. Plus, after singing "Baby Love" for over 50 years, perhaps it keeps her at a better game to stretch her wings a bit and throw in something new? Win for the fans, win for her.

DMCFAN
06-18-2018, 09:52 PM
Could not agree with this more. I've seen her show multiple times over the past 20 years & decided a few years ago I needed to let it go due to it being the same show for so long. I didn't blame her - she was giving the fans what they wanted. I don't know if she realized the hard core fans that keep coming to see her and wanting more. She seemed to step out of the box for this show & it worked! Maybe she was reluctant to change what has worked but she only did one Supremes song & got rave reviews. There seemed to be a certain vulnerability with this show -especially with Amazing Grace. Hope all is ok with her & hope she continues to step out of the box for the upcoming Vegas gig. Can you imagine hard core fans going crazy at intro of Surrender or I'm Still Waiting?? And she's looking fabulous

milven
06-18-2018, 10:26 PM
I missed her last few appearances in my area for the same reason. Setlist never changed and also her band was bare bone minimul. Had I known that she was doing a different show at the Bowl, I would have flown out to see the show. I've only been to the Hollywood Bowl once to see Carol Burnett but sat way back.

I would have loved to see Diana at the Hollywood Bowl singing these songs with a full orchrestra. Oh well, at least a lot of it was on You Tube

midnightman
06-18-2018, 11:25 PM
Most younger DR fans grew up with her when she wasn't in the Supremes so the beginning of their knowledge of Diana might've been in the disco or post disco eras of the '70s and '80s and others who grew up with her in the '90s probably remember when she did songs like If We Hold On Together and When You Tell Me You Love Me and Take Me Higher and became fans then [[I began calling myself a DR fan at age four lol).

It's like with people who attended MJ shows and preferred him solo or preferred his material post-Thriller. Sometimes when you amass different generations of fans, they're gonna have different opinions.

jack020
06-19-2018, 02:12 AM
https://variety.com/2018/music/news/diana-ross-hollywood-bowl-opening-night-1202849338/
It’s a fairly safe assumption that by the time most superstar singers reach their 70s, they’re pretty set in their setlist ways. So there was plenty of reason to suspect that Diana Ross [[https://variety.com/t/diana-ross/)’ performance with the Hollywood Bowl [[https://variety.com/t/hollywood-bowl/) Orchestra at the host venue’s official season opener Saturday night would be essentially a reprise of the show she was doing in her Las Vegas residency this past winter, with strings attached. But in this case, the answer to that eternal question of hers — “Do you know where you’re going to?” — was, wonderfully, no.
Saturday’s show turned out to be a true one-off, filled with songs Ross rarely — or never — performs live; only seven of the 16 choices overlapped with the set the Supreme being was doing in Sin City earlier in the year. She’s veteran enough to know that when you score a pickup band as good as the 70-piece-plus that filled the Bowl stage, you make use of the occasion to mix it up a little. It was presumably conductor Thomas Wilkins’ influence at work in a lot of these choices, leaving out some familiar chestnuts in favor of more oboe-friendly obscurities. And if the main rationale was which tunes lent themselves toward the lushest arrangements, it had the welcome side effect of giving the most hardcore Ross aficionados an evening that felt “Upside Down” in all the right ways.
The first clue that this wouldn’t be a merely augmented version of a typical Ross show came with the opening number, which, for one of the few times in the last decade, was not “I’m Coming Out.” [[That standby didn’t come out at all Saturday, to the disappointment of some, given an audience that surely had a substantial overlap with last weekend’s Pride parade.) Instead, she and the Bowl orchestra opened with “He Lives in You,” a song associated primarily with the “Lion King” musical, which, as far as just about anyone could remember, Ross was last seen performing in an Oprah appearance in the late ‘90s — which might have been one of the last times she had a full vocal ensemble in attendance to pull the tune off, like the Fred Martin Choir that sat [[or stood) in on several numbers Saturday. Most likely, it was picked for that slot because of its tribal majesty, although you couldn’t rule out someone having realized that it’s actually the perfect holiday number for Father’s Day Eve.
From there, it was onto more familiar territory, at least for a while, with “More Today Than Yesterday,” which Ross has made enough of a tour staple over the decades that some fans probably mistake it for a Supremes tune, and “You Can’t Hurry Love,” which turned out to be the only actual Supremes number of the night. The typical medley of her original group’s material wasn’t much missed — except maybe by the minority of the audience that hadn’t seen a half-dozen Ross tours before — as she went on to concentrate mostly on singles from the mid-‘70s through early ‘90s, including rarely performed picks like “If We Hold On Together,” “It’s My Turn,” “Home,” and one that she surprisingly almost never pulled out on tour until last year, the “Mahogany” theme. There was reassuring familiarity at show’s end, in the form of “Upside Down,” “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” — another tour certainty she’s fooled fans into imagining she originated — and “Reach Out and Touch Somebody’s Hand,” which has never required a full choir to succeed, but which doesn’t suffer from one, either.
But it was three outside choices in the middle of the show — all of which predated even the Supremes by decades — that gave the show a memorably historical and emotional core. “My Man” is a true oldie Ross performed at the Bowl a decade ago and brought back Saturday, even though it’s a song more often associated with Barbra Streisand and, Fanny Brice before Babs. That led naturally into a cover Ross is more closely tied to, via “Lady Sings the Blues,” the Billie Holliday classic “The Man I Love,” which brought out the saxes in the Bowl orchestra’s mix.

Prior to these, on the other side of a costume change, was a ‘70s standard — 1770s, that is — “Amazing Grace,” which Ross has not been known to pull out in performance before. Whether it was spiritual or strictly stylistic reasons that led her to go gospel just this once, she owned it far more than you would expect anyone who’s owned that many Bob Mackie gowns to have a righteous right to. She seemed to forget the words in the opening stanza, but the huge confluence of moving parts that is an orchestra somehow seamlessly moved back to the beginning with her, and she brought home the rest of the song like someone whose last residency had been at the Church of God in Christ, not the Wynn. She may have an Aretha-returns-to-church album in her yet.
Even in a show as music-focused as this one, a lack of costume changes would have been a disappointment, so there were just the right amount — two — revealing three variations on a theme, with Ross emerging each time nearly lost in colorful, all-consuming ruffles that eventually got downgraded to the longest train this side of Union Station before being laid aside to be retrieved by a lackey. Fortunately, she appears to have taken care of her voice in recent years as well as her handlers take care of wardrobe; a few of the rough edges that are an inevitable byproduct of 74 didn’t detract from the pleasure of hearing Ross go for it — as much as she ever has in her career — and unlazily land each number.

Stage banter was minimal, and not necessarily by Ross’ design, as she was working with a band larger than one she can easily cue [[with some of her regular musicians joining the orchestra). “I wanted to talk, but it’s too late now,” she lamented over the opening of “Theme from Mahogany,” signaling the loss of some introductory story we were not destined to hear. She did get a word edgewise before the closing number, telling the audience that she had been “playing with my grandkids and I broke my ankle… That’s why I didn’t move around, guys. Didn’t you see I couldn’t move? I was doing lots of hand movements,” she joked, breaking into oversized breaststroke motions.
The lack of visible boogieing on Ross’ part hadn’t been much noticed, anyway, since it seemed as if she were being deferential to the spirit of the orchestra, if anything. Not every performer who gets hooked up with the Bowl orchestra is as willing to share; some previous headliners have used the mass of strings as subliminal backup more than equal partner. Her willingness to share the reins for a unique one-nighter was just another reason to call her Miss Boss.
Prior to intermission, Wilkins led the Bowl orchestra in a selection from John Williams’ “E.T.” score, then brought out 29 members of YOLA, the Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles, to augment the adult players on Arturo Marquez’s “Conga del fuego nuevo.” As always, the opening night served as a benefit for the LA Phil’s work with YOLA and other educational outreach programs; this year’s gala was reported to have raised more than $1.75 million.

RanRan79
06-19-2018, 08:37 AM
So so does anyone care to chime in : gas Ross’ solo career so far eclipsed her Supremes’ hits as to make them unwanted????

She couldn't eclipse the Supremes [[the original trio) if she wanted to. And I think she wanted to. Lol I think there's two issues on why some feel this way though. On one hand, I have to admit that as big of a Ross fan as I am, and as big of a Supremes fan as I am, there's a certain magic missing when she sings these songs. Is it because Flo and Mary aren't with her? Maybe. Is it the arrangement of the songs? Possibly. Whatever it is, I get more excited about her performing one of her many solo cuts than her doing anything Supremes, unless she were to do something obscure like "A Breath Taking Guy". For me, as a fan, the Supremes songs just don't sound quite right without the Supremes.

On the other hand, I think that the reception the songs receives probably depends on the audience. If Ross is performing for an audience made up mostly of people who came of age in the years since she went solo, they probably aren't as dependent on her years as a Supreme. When I was growing up, Diana Ross had long since left the group. And while I knew who the Supremes were the way I knew who other classic artists were, they were a long gone group while Diana Ross was a current superstar. It just happened that at a certain point I became a bigger fan of the Supremes, and Diana Ross by herself couldn't topple that. I'm probably the exception in my age group on that. But I can't imagine that the Boomers prefer Ross' solo stuff to the music she created with Flo and Mary. Ultimately it comes down to age, I think, and that's okay. Diana Ross is different things to different people and aint nothing wrong with that.

RanRan79
06-19-2018, 08:40 AM
I think you can look at it two ways:

With the Supremes, she amassed 23 Top 10 hits; 12 #1's.

As a solo artist, she amassed 12 Top 10 hits; 6 #1's.

Clearly as a Supreme, she had more hits.

However, her tenure with the Supremes was only 10 years. Her solo hit making years is double that. Take into account her solo career period is almost 50 years.

So while she'll always be remembered as being a Supreme, her trio days are basically 1/5 of her entire career.

I agree with all of this.

RanRan79
06-19-2018, 08:42 AM
Most younger DR fans grew up with her when she wasn't in the Supremes so the beginning of their knowledge of Diana might've been in the disco or post disco eras of the '70s and '80s and others who grew up with her in the '90s probably remember when she did songs like If We Hold On Together and When You Tell Me You Love Me and Take Me Higher and became fans then [[I began calling myself a DR fan at age four lol).

It's like with people who attended MJ shows and preferred him solo or preferred his material post-Thriller. Sometimes when you amass different generations of fans, they're gonna have different opinions.

I just said something similar. I agree. I knew who the J5 was and I knew their music frontwards and backwards. But when he was at the peak of his fame, had I gone to a MJ concert and it was full of J5 tunes as opposed to cuts from Thriller, OTW, Bad or Dangerous, MJ would've got cut!!

Boogiedown
06-20-2018, 05:02 PM
The Jacksons were still touring up until 1985

PeaceNHarmony
06-21-2018, 10:14 AM
Diana is in the enviable situation of a rare group of singers in that she simply has way too many hit singles and crowd favorites to ever create a sui generis setlist. So be it. Audiences love her!