1979 - Caesar’s Palace Spectacular Featuring Diana Ross - My Reactions

     Well, it was probably something I would be afraid of going to because basically it was a big show,

 

something like a sporting event in some way or another.

     So when I saw on YouTube what I missed in 1979, I realized that Diana Ross as the foremost

singing superstar and actress—and not just simply a disco diva per se.

      So along with The Eddie Kendrick Singers and the Caesar’s Palace Orchestra as well as a

rhythm section that I often had seen in a house band in the 1970s version of “Name That Tune”

(which featured a pianist, keyboardist/organist, bassist and drummer), Diana Ross pulled off, in

my opinion, a spectacular concert that not only shook the audience who attended at Caesar’s,

but also all of Las Vegas and the rest of America as well. A great show that mixed in everything you

 

see in theater—projections on the walls, cheesy colorful lighting, dramatic sets, change of wardrobe

especially for Diana herself, a background orchestra and singers, dancing, and even some audience

participation—and even a few Diana fans allowed to go on stage and dance with Diana (fortunately

those people did not hit on Diana, those people were modest).

         “Love Hangover”, in my opinion, was the most “theatrical” of the numbers in that concert

spectacular. It was lovely for my part to see my thoughts of surrealistic dreams in the middle of the

song, as the music—which started out as a slow disco ballad in E-flat minor---segued into an high-

energy disco funk number, as I saw the dancers (about 5 or 6 of them) on stage do mainly jazz,

 

modern, and some disco dance moves---as Diana Ross left the stage for a while to change to a

different costume.

At that point, I was saying to myself, “When will Diana Ross appear? When will Diana Ross appear?”

And  then, I got that wish—just before the song ends, the dancers introduce Diana Ross from the

covered curtains onto the stage, wearing a sparkling blue costume (hope I am right) as she is lifted

by the dancers. I then said to myself, “I wish I was going to be famous just like that Diana!”

          One moment that intrigued me in the show was one of the show dancers on roller skates

when Diana sang the disco number “The Boss”. This has a bit of something coming out of Andrew

Lloyd Webber’s roller-skating musical, “Starlight Express”, but it wasn’t really that much.  The song

was a bit more lively than the “Love Hangover” that used to like, and I saw that the whole audience

clapped their hands and stomped their feet, and a few others stood up from the tables and seats to

do their own version of disco freestyle dancing—the way

Diana wanted it to look like. Oh yeah!

          The last song in that concert, “All For One, and One For All”, was a song that strongly

emphasized Diana as not only a “we” person”, and not just an “I” person. She sang her heart out in

all-white attire, including her dress and gown, so the effect I felt was that she felt quite “heavenly”.

           So the total package Diana delivered was not only  the ballads and disco numbers we grew up

with, but also the songs that appeared in her actress appearances in the movies, “The Wiz” and

“Mahogany.”

Primary source:

“Diana Ross: All For One, Caesar’s Palace , 1979, Closing  (Part 17 of 17),
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YP16vnUB7uw. Uploaded on June 13, 2009.