Philadelphia SOI was held on Thursday, Feb. 25. Not sold out at all like last year. I must start off by saying I was absolutely crushed when Joelle broke the news about no Kurt. I really thought about selling my tickets which were center ice. I took my 8 year old son and a friend. Andrew is a huge Scott fan (Kurt too). He was soooo bored.
The opening act is schmaltzy (I thought so when it was on TV). It was kind of ruined when Scott came out and tripped . . . everyone gasped. He joked about it in his welcome . . . He was standing too close to the Zambian exhaust. We noticed that he was extremely out of breath. When they introduced Illia, I kept thinking he's trying to be Kurt. He is NOT a footwork skater. The we forgot someone was lame. I honestly was surprised that Tara did not get better applause.
The highlights and low lights . . .
The absolute best was Scott's One Week by BNL. Wonderful! He doubled the lutz but the axels and toes were great. Footwork and hands absolutely gorgeous. He has new glasses from the TV show (better, I think) black with taped frames. He did not get a standing O. The crowd took a long time to get warmed up for this show.
I was not impressed with Tara's programs except Second Element. I thought it was quite nice. The clown number was OK. Katia Gordeeva walked around without skates on and was pretty funny. The "Precision" part with the in line spirals and sit backs was sloppy. I thought many of the group elements were sloppy . . . the finale in particular.
Kristi's Concerto was very nice, she doubled a lutz, I liked her Japanese poetry number very quiet . . . just skimmed the ice, but she wore a red dress with big black Japanese characters down the side. Yuch.
Illia's number Tango one (seisuno?) was OK but not wonderful. He needs to finish the positions. (I sound like Dick Button, don't I) Does Illia have a coach yet??
Many people have not liked Steven Cousin's role in the show. I liked it. Sometimes it was a little long, but he can carry it off pretty well. The best part of the show (other than Scott) was the black light Muse number leading into Steven Cousins Invisible Man number. I saw him do this program on TV at Canadian Pros, so I was eager to see it live. He wears a funky striped shirt that glowed. Not as high energy as Canadian Pros but great. He has learned to pace it a little better I think. I wish he would win a title so he could get more respect ... oh well, maybe he could team up with Dan Hollander??
Bechke and Platov were great, nice moves. Elena doesn't look like she's suffering too much with her groin pull. Meno and Sand, on the other hand were rather blah save the "swoop" at the end of their program.
Katia's program was nicer live than on TV very pretty and effortless, she blew her axel, but did a nice 2 lutz. Lovely skater.
Ros did great! Nice number, gorgeous costume, she looks thinner than I remember. Absolutely spectacular double axel. Someone yelled as she skated off, "We'll miss you." She waved again. We will miss her.
Roca and Sur--loved their number. For the one though, Gorsha came off as a little too Jerod Swallowish (I put a Spell on you) for my tastes. Renee is so thin and lovely. Great team, they really have learned how to perform for an audience.
The Four Corners number was great too, but I only watched Katia and Denis, Elena was lost in this number. Illia and Katia were good together, but Denis and Katia commanded the attention. Great number with driving music.
Illia's Noise number was interesting, but again . . . Kurt could do this better. Even I could scrape my toe picks on the ice half decently! I'm a 35 year old Mom and only skated for a year and a half! Didn't do anything for me. I like Illia, I hope he gets the whole package together though.
Scott's Keeping the Customer Satisfied was nice. He got a standing O for that, he seemed surprised and even did a double take at the one end of the arena that really cheered him on. The man has slowed down, but he's still wonderful.
The finale was lackluster. Many of the skaters were off, especially Katia and Lu Lu.
No one really seemed to have any high energy excitement.
You just hate to see things change. No Kurt, no Sergei, no Paul Wylie, no Torvil and Dean. Sigh . . . The close family energy was just not there. SOI '99 was good, but not great. It was shorter too, which was OK with me. This year I did NOT send in my advanced ticket order the day after the show. This year's SOI was missing something . . .
And will someone tell SOI to have some kid's sized T-shirts please!!!
I bought tickets to Champions on Ice 4/11 for the first time this year. I'm looking forward to seeing Michelle, Oksana, Brian and Rudy. I hope it's a good show!
BUT I WANTED TO SEE KURT BROWNING LIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! pardon me!
At least we got to see him on TV a whole bunch this year. Scott too with the Tara special! :-)))
Respectfully submitted,
Jamey
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