Kristoffer Gildenlöw, Live At Parktheater Alphen a/d Rijn, The Netherlands, 21 November 2015

It was a special theater show called ‘A Night To Remember’. Kristoffer Gildenlöw and band would perform tracks from the album Rust plus some songs of his new upcoming album which will be released in 2016. The performance would be filmed and be released on a DVD too. I’ve never been to Parktheater before and never went to a gig of Kristoffer Gildenlöw, so this was quite a new experience for me. The location is beautiful, I love old Dutch manors. Once I entered the theatre I noticed that the ground of the stage was covered in real leaves. It really smelled like the forest because of those leaves. There were big wooden panels on the stage too (later Kris told the audience that the panels were trees, and after the show the panels could be bought and the money would be donated to charity). There was also an old telephone on the ground, right in the centre of the stage. Kathy Keller, Kristoffer’s band manager, gave a short speech of what to expect before the show started.

The show started with Kristoffer Gildenlöw picking up the phone that was on the ground, and ‘answering’ the phone. He grabbed a fretless bass guitar and started to play on it, very beautiful. During the gig Kris played on a variety of instruments. He also played on keyboards, acoustic guitar and electric guitar. Kris surrounded himself with very good musicians during the show. The band members were only on stage when they had to play. After the track Heroes guitarist Paul Coenradie played a fantastic guitar solo. Keyboardist David Gutierrez Rojas also had a long solo moment. He played a brilliant piano solo. After the piano solo he surprised the audience with an extra ambient/soundscape solo.

When Kris came back on stage he announced that they were going to play songs from the new upcoming album The Rain. After playing She, a track from his new album, Kris wanted to talk but the microphone was on mute. When the microphone was on again he made a joke about it. Mister Gildenlöw had a big surprise for the audience… Well, a surprise for the audience who didn’t read the inscription on the Facebook event page of this special gig. Kris wanted that the complete audience would sing along with the song In The Evening. He gave instructions to the people in the audience which notes they had to sing. Kris was jokingly telling the audience that they had to sing as loud as football supporters cheering when their favourite team had scored. He and the band really took the time to make sure they audience would sing the right notes at the right rhythm. David helped the audience with singing on the right rhythm with great hand gestures. When the audience finally had it right Kris and band started to play the song and gestured to the audience when they had to sing. The audience sang loud and clear, and even kept on singing while the band slowly left the stage. After the complete band was gone the audience started to clap and cheer. The band came back on stage and when the audience was calmed down Kris made a joke about the fact that the band has to come back when the audience keeps on clapping. The band played two extra songs from the album Rust as an encore.

It was a lovely show, I really enjoyed every minute of it. The album Rust is a brilliant album and the new tracks that were played made me really curious. I’m also very curious about the DVD, and I hope I don’t sing too much out of tune, haha. Kristoffer Gildenlöw is an amazing artist who has surrounded himself with brilliant musicians. The music is sweet and tender progressive rock, but has its powerful moments and contains a lot of emotion. I really hope to see him live again soon, and I hope you will too!