Essay Collection

Carole King Concert Review

Grace Crilly
Professor Boulous
Carole King Concert Review
01 April 2022

Reading the name 'Carole King' on our sign-up sheet I remembered hearing that name from somewhere, but I'm unsure of how I was familiar with it. I did in fact look her up and found that she is considered one of the greatest singer-songwriters of all time. I was eager to watch a concert of this well-known artist who I was unaware of, as well as to learn about her as a performer. In this essay I'll be discussing my experience watching a Carole King concert, as well as getting to know her as a performer.

Carole King is an American singer-songwriter. King is a caucasion female and she speaks and sings in English as the language. The culture based on her skin color, King could be irish or german for a person who's white or even jewish. The setting of the concert is at the BBC Television Center in London. This concert was held on February 10, 1971. The duration of the concert was twenty-eight minutes. King performs songs such as "I Feel The Earth Move," and "It's Too Late" which are considered her greatest songs of all time. As well as the song "Natural Woman" by Aretha Franklin and "Will You (Still) Love Me Tomorrow" by The Shirelles as covers. More songs that King performed are: "So Far Away," "Smackwater Jack," and "Up On The Roof." The songs she performs consist of more than one style and genre of music I grasped listening to her musically and lyrically is between soul, pop, and soft rock. In this concert King is dressed up in a pink dress and white sandal with a heel as one of the ways she is presented visually in the concept of style in this concert. Furthermore, King has a lot of facial expressions as she performs. I can see this in a lot of her facial movements from the motion traditionally of muscles beneath the skin. The expression she performs with also includes body language, the concept of the body, into how she's performing within the playing of the piano where her arms, shoulders, and fingers are moving within notes and chords as she's playing on the piano. The expression of King and further into the stage and performers, the inside of the concert is what the visual aspect of the concert is. King accompanies herself on the piano on songs such as "I Feel The Earth Move," "Natural Woman," "Will You (Still) Love Me Tomorrow" and "Up On The Roof," and further with more performers such as James Taylor and Danny Korchmar on guitar, Charles Larkey on bass, Ralph Schuckett on piano alongside her and Joel O'Brien on drums. James Taylor is a second-accompaniment to the piano alongside King performing "So Far Away." James Taylor performs sitting on the edge of the stage. In the duration of their performance vividly shown from camera angles, after King introduces Taylor to come up on stage in addition to Charles Larkey and transitions to introduce the song "So Far Away." We can see Larkey on the right with his guitar, King in the middle on the piano bench, and Taylor on the left sitting on the edge of the stage. The camera angles cut to shot to shot presently showing Taylor and then to Larkey, after King introduces them. Taylor is shown wearing street clothes where Taylor is wearing a gray short sleeved shirt and khaki pants. Larkey is a little more dressed up than Taylor, wearing jeans and a collared light blue shirt with a dark purple shirt on top of it. Schukett is wearing a light blue plaid shirt with jeans. Joel O'Brien is wearing a short sleeved yellow shirt and red pants. Shuckett and O'Brien are her second and third accompaniment performing "Smackwater Jack." The camera angle shows Taylor, Larkey, King, Schuckett, and O'Brien presenting their attire style clearly to the cameras.

The camera angles flow from each cut on how King herself introduces performers and each song. King shows high energy that's very expressive in joyful and cheerfulness when she is talking to the audience. Talking to the audience is highly skilled in performing. King shows her purpose of the concert by addressing the performers and each song, as well as having a happy and energetic attitude, by giving the audience a great show. In this concert, I can see the audience, where they show engagement and insight in her performance from the applause we can hear and see the reaction from the camera angles being used. The use of camera angles also presently show the lighting used, as the functions of the concert to presently show King and other performers. The lighting reflects on King and other performers such as Taylor and Larkey from the camera angles that show the three of them performing "So Far Away." In one shot as King singing and playing the piano with Taylor playing the guitar alongside her. Then transitions into just King as a close-up and transitions out to see the lighting and scenery above them as one white lighting fixture as well as four blue lighting fixtures as structured like an old modern television. Taylor exits the stage after performing "So Far Away," where King introduces another performer, Danny Korchmar who performs alongside her and Larkey on the song "It's Too Late." Korchmar is dressed in gray pants and a multicolored long sleeve shirt. Since the concert is located at the BBC Television Center In London, the concert was televised as a prerequisite. The camera angles highlight the presentation of the stage and performers from different portions of the stage, as we see additional chairs, piano benches, pillows on the stage, chords and speakers for the sound system through their microphones and guitars, as part of production value in this concert. When King announces to the audience they are performing, "It's Too Late" together, we can see a shot of them where Korchmar is on the right sitting on a chair and King sitting on the piano bench about to start the song, and Larkey on King's left sitting on a chair. On King's left, and in the middle as a viewer of the concert, we can see a drum set on the stage, with the set-up of instruments that looks like bangos with a drumstick on top of one of them closest to King. In the next shot, we see Larkey on King's left performing on his guitar right beside King playing the piano. This shot transitions into a camera angle where we see Korchmar in front of King, the angle transitions back to a close up of King and back to the shot of King and Larkey performing beside each other. Close ups of King, we can see in the background the lighting in different colors purple, pink, blue and green that are blurred. Outside of what I see out of the concert, I'm listening to her musically and lyrically.

Lyrically, "So Far Away'' stood out to me as the concept of being in a long distance relationship with less contact with one another as its meaning, "It would be so fine to see your face at my door. Doesn't help to know you're so far away." Another lyric that stood out to me was, "Doesn't anybody stay in one place anymore?" based on frustrations couples get when they are long distance from each other and alternatively with people that eventually end up leaving in your life such as friends and family. When I was listening to "I Feel The Earth Move" and "Smackwater Jack" musically, the upbeat tone I found to be a great song that introduces to one's mind and body that gets them in the groove of how they're listening to the music. This upbeat tone shows King's identity as well as purpose in the concert of her joyful and cheerful attitude on putting on a show for her audience. I particularly wanted to discuss "So Far Away," "I Feel The Earth Move," and "Smackwater Jack," as King sings lyrics she wrote based on the thought process of looking at the lyrics' meaning within the authenticity and perspective versus how the music made me feel in my body as I listened musically.

My overall impression of Carole King as a performer in her concert is that she is both original with such skill to put on a show, addressing each song and performer with a cheerful and joyful attitude. King especially puts on a show with performers such as Schukett accompanying alongside her on the piano. I enjoyed the energy they both had in the groove of the upbeat tone. I, overall, enjoyed the concert because of her attitude and the effort in her alto range within the clear production of her accompanying herself on the piano alongside Taylor and Larkey on guitar, Korchmar on bass, O'Brien on drums, Schukett on piano.

In conclusion, In this essay I discussed my experience watching a Carole King concert as well as getting to know her as a performer.