Welllllllll, I’ll tell ya! People get up and leave! That is exactly what happened last night at the Doo Wop Extravaganza, the annual Labor Day concert at The Great Auditorium.
The first surprise of the evening was Kenny Vance and the Planotones; Kenny with his extraordinary voice and devoted Auditorium fans has for the past several years been the closing act of the concert. He brings the house down as his voice goes up and up and up! Why was he the opening act? Several people around me murmured the same thought; did he have another show to go to? We don’t know the answer to that question. What we do know is that he was NOT the headliner of this particular Doo Wop show. And why not? BECAUSE this year’s star was Martha Reeves, formerly of Martha & The Vandellas.
I’ve never seen Martha perform before so I don’t have a standard by which to measure her performance. What I saw was truly disgraceful. She wasn’t on stage more than 15 minutes when people began to get up and leave. She was erratic, her enunciation and projection left so much to be desired that it was impossible to understand the words to any song she was feebly attempting to sing! I’m not going to speculate on what was wrong with her last night that caused her to forget words to songs, stop in the middle and chastise the band because they weren’t on count or worse yet, to ask the audience to clap on command by the number. I swear there wasn’t one person in the audience who knew when to clap. Add that to the fact that she consistently referred to her venue as being in Ocean View! It was just too much. We left right after the clapping fiasco. I have never left a concert in Ocean Grove before. They haven’t all been great but never so bad that I wanted to just get out of there.
Not going to end this commentary on a sour note, NOT when I can extoll the virtues of Kenny Vance’s performance. He was fabulous as always, we are never disappointed with the Planotones and 3 standing ovations to prove it. How does he hold those falsetto notes so long? He is gifted with a clear and strong voice and over the years has perfected his falsetto voice and incorporated it into many more of their songs.
One of the great treasures of Ocean Grove and the United States is our Great Auditorium and as a venue for great performers, it stands alone. Every singer this year has mentioned the magnificence of the Great Auditorium, its marvelous acoustics enhance every performance; I look forward to next year’s roster of entertainers, knowing of course that Kenny Vance and The Planotones will be back to trill and thrill us.
Kenny Vance
Bill Ding and his band of clowns are the security patrol for this blog site. He is a favorite toy from the 50*s. By the way sometimes a blog is just an ego-maniacal stream of conscience.
Pbenjay's Blog 
I have to agree with you. Kenny was great as usual, But the Skyliners were bad, the band was bad and it just got worse with Martha Reeves. I was one of those who walked out after the second song.
Would have loved if The Planotones were the whole show. Instead of the the live Skyliners I would not have minded them lipsyncing to their 40th Anniversary Show.
I can’t imagine why the Planotones were not the closing act.
Great, honest, real review! Thanks for the insight of the Labor Day concert.