As a birthday present for my lovely Jennifer, I managed to get my hands on a pair of floor tickets for this year’s Trans-Siberian Concert, November 29th at 7:30pm at the Air Canada Center.

For those of you who might not be familiar with this band, they are a modern interpretation of Christmas music: Kind of a combination of traditional orchestra combined with heavy metal guitar. It’s really not bad, and I’d recommend that you give them a listen if you have a chance too, you might enjoy them

I managed to get off work that day a couple of hours early to make sure that I arrived in Toronto in time to meet Jennifer who was coming into town on the Bus. Funny enough, I arrived in time but got turned around while trying to find the bus station and wandered around downtown Toronto for a bit before getting turned right and finding Jennifer.

Together we took a stroll down Young street, admiring the sights as we made our way towards Union Station and the Air Canada Center.

The concert itself was phenomenal, the light show itself was worth the entrance price. At one point they even made it snow inside of the ACC (fake snow, but snow none the less!). It had to be one of the most impressive light shows that I’ve ever witnessed in my 30 years. We’ll be going for sure again next year.

For some pictures of the event, you can check out the gallery.

Robert Cray was the opening act, and put on a good show.  He was very personal, introducing us to each song:  It almost made the ACC seem more like a small venue than the stadium that it is.

Following the opening act, we had a pause of about 15-20 minutes while they got the stage ready for Eric.  I’m not sure if they were having problems or what.  It just seemed odd, given that when I watched him at the ACC in 2004, I don’t remember nearly as long a prep time between Robert Randolph to Eric Clapton.

Once he took the stage however, any frustration over the prep time was lost.  His 2004 band was nearly entirely changed, becoming increasingly more youthful.  Doyle was still there on guitar, but also joining him was Derek Trucks  who plays for the Allman Brothers band, as well as his own Band:  The Derek Trucks Band.  Steve Gadd was replaced on drums by a young fellow who seemed much more enthused about playing with Clapton than Steve seemed to.

The majority of the concert turned into a 3 way guitar battle between Doyle, Derek and Eric much to the crowds pleasure.  If you get the opportunity, look into some of Derek Trucks albums, he’s quite the guitarist, and between Doyle and himself, he was the only one (in my opinion) to give Clapton a run for his money.

The highlight of the show for me, however, had to be the encore act.  Clapton’s band was joined on stage by Robert Cray and we had a 4 guitar rendition of Crossroads (one of my all time favorite songs).  I nearly floated out of the arena following that.

We both had a great time, and I’m hoping with his new album due out in November that we might see another tour in 2008.