Hamburger Abendblatt - April 10, 2011


by pw

translation by Astrid Nolde-Gallasch


Chris de Burgh enchanted his audience in Hamburg


His female fans entered the stage already before the break. For three hours Chris de Burgh enchanted his audience on Saturday in 
the O2-World.

HAMBURG. Chris de Burgh enchanted his audience on Saturday in the O2-World. He could hardly embrace those many bouquets, 
in the end he also gets the obligary teddy bear which the Irish rock bard quickly uses for a little ventriloquist act. He is meanwhile 62 
years old, one can hardly believe it. The very big times, in which the man who was born in Argentina could fill the big halls effortlessly 
in Germany, may be over. In Hamburg there were at least 5500 fans who wanted to experience Chris de Burgh - and they were not 
disappointed. Chris de Burgh is surely one of the best service providers in the worldwide pop business. The show starts right on time, 
almost to the minute, the sound is precisely crisp - a recording should be sent to all sound engineers of his competitors as a demo - 
and the star is in the best mood. On this evening he brought with him his new concept album "Moonfleet & Other Stories" with songs 
about smugglers and pirates. The stage has been decorated accordingly in a maritime style. But otherwise: No experiments. The 
new songs are all catchy. Chris de Burgh moves around confidently on the cuddly sound carpet, which his first class, four members 
band is weaving.

As a perfect service provider the Irish man knows of course that his German fans - he sold more than 45 million albums in this 
country - want to hear mostly his old hits. During "Lady In Red" Chris de Burgh leaves the stage, marches singingly through the rows 
of the audience, enjoys a bath in the crowd. He hugs fans, shakes a lot of hans, even takes his time for some pictures with mobile 
phone cameras. Meanwhile his band pirates may desert, he performs on his own for six quiet songs.

Only cuddle rocker? No, in the end Chris de Burgh really speeds up, he even covers the hit by Toto "Africa", and gets it really 
cracking with "High on emotion". And then he promises that he will come back in any case. Yes, he may. After all he is a really 
good host.