Gdansk Shipyard

Ticket scan - Pawel K. Szulczewski

Concert poster - Luke

Concert starts: 9pm

Address of venue: Shipyard, Gdansk, Poland. MAP

Location website: www.gdansk.pl

NEW - event website: www.gilmour.pl

SHOW BACKGROUND

David's management have announced that David will be extending his tour further by visiting Poland. His excellent blog site reports that the show will be before a huge crowd of 100,000, and "marks the 26th anniversary of Poland's 1980 revolution, where nation-wide strikes led to the eventual fall of communism.

"Pawel Adamowicz, Mayor of Gdansk, has invited David to perform a special concert in the Gdansk shipyards... [The date is] a national holiday in Poland, as it commemorates the day in which the Solidarity trade union was founded."

David's own website have announced that tickets for this show went on sale July 10th. As previously announced, the show is at a large venue by the docks, previously host to large-scale events by performers such as Jean Michel Jarre.

David's site reveals that the performance will be the full two-hour-plus version (no opening act), as seen at the Royal Albert Hall, with the full complement of Marc Brickman's lighting – including lasers. For the first time, David's live show will include an orchestra, with renowned Polish composer Zbigniew Preisner conducting his arrangements from the On An Island album – which is a Platinum record in Poland – so there should be plenty of excitement.

Finally, David's website notes that the Gdansk performance is by kind invitation of Lech Walesa, President of Solidarity, and Pawel Adamowicz, Mayor of Gdansk.

Zbigniew Preisner's orchestra will include 38 musicians in his symphony orchestra. The promoters have said that David might be preparing a new piece for the concert. Speculation in Poland is that it might be a cover version of the famous MURY + Walls of the late Jacek Kaczmarski, the legendary Polish songwriter, poet and singer for freedom and polish independence from Soviet Union, and the person comparable to Bob Dylan. MURY became The Solidarity anthem although its message is quite sad and concerns the poet's alienation in the world rather than breaking the walls and chains to get freedom. More information here. We have spoken to David's management and they do NOT expect any change to the normal set list... and certainly they are not expecting the inclusion of an Polish songs.

A new website has been set up to mark the event, and give plenty of useful information. In Polish and English, www.gilmour.pl should give you all the detail you need...

The use of six large screens above the stage was a novel twist - each following the performance of a different musician:

One change to the normal roster of songs was the very apt "A Great Day For Freedom" which was played as part of the encores.

Initial reports are starting to come through, and all agree, David and his band wanted to go out in style! Our thanks to Kuba Klimek and to Bogdan Baraszkiewicz for the swift reporting of the set list. Bogdan also supplied the picture above.

SHOW REVIEW

By BD contributor, Kuba Klimek

We all knew that it would be an emotional event. I was there three hours before the start of the show. The excitement was unbelievable.

David appeared onstage half hour before the show and waved to the crowd. The crowd screamed. He disappeared and came back punctually at 9 PM. The lights went down. The smoke appeared. The crowd screamed once again but not the last time.

When Breathe begun people became to shout and screamed like a wild beast. All of us. Teenagers, thirty- ,forty- fifty years old. And then it happened… Rick forgot the verse and sung wrong line that's why they didn’t start Breathe Reprise. They played rhythm of Time solo. All looked at David and waiting for a rescue. Rick start to sing Time chorus and they jumped to Breathe Reprise. Guy Pratt became to laugh as crazy. But David was bit embarrassed. It was first mistake of all three that evening. David said ‘Hello’ and started to play On An Island LP with an orchestra. The first part ended.

After 20 minutes David came on stage and started to play Shine On… great version. Without Ricks organ but with the sound of wineglasses made by Guy Pratt, Phil Manzanera and Dick Parry. The crowd sung with David. Fantastic!

Astronomy Domine was great but Rick made second mistake. He started to sing first verse to quick. David started to play Fat Old Sun but after some time stopped and started again. Jon Carins slide guitar was off. Fat Old Sun solo blew ours brains out! Terrific! And Echoes…. Absolutely perfect….

Wish You Were Here was sung by more than 50 thousand people. Magic! And Comfortably Numb was a moment I was waiting for all my life.

Great show, great moments, great affection and me at last at great show by GREAT David Gilmour. My hero…

SHOW REVIEW

By BD contributor, Arek Druzdzel

On Saturday morning I went to Gdansk. There was some 60.000 people in the audience, in the Solidarity Shipyard scenery (huge cranes behind the scene and old factory buildings). Huge stage and absolutely magnificent sound quality throughout the concert. What amazed me, there were 10+ teens and 60+ people standing shoulder to shoulder, smiling and enjoying every tiny piece of music, shall I say every sound?

David started with "Breathe" and then "Time" so that everybody was in heaven right from the beginning. Then he played a set with all songs from his new album. Every piece was slightly different, some more tunes added? played differently? He certainly looked happy on stage, smiling, speaking Polish (!!!), chatting with other musicians... What fantastic music it was.

After the approx. 20min break, there was the 2nd set, with Pink Floyd stuff only. He started with "Shine on...", very gentle version, played almost accoustically and very, very personal, inspiring way. While David was singing, the rest of the band remained silent... Starting with such a diamond, he played then "Astronomy Domine" and a few older pieces, from before "Dark Side", eg "Fat old sun", "Wot's ... uh the deal" (remember that one?). Then there were "High Hopes" and "Echoes" - incredible, over 20min. version, absolutely amazing... What He did with his guitar was absolutely unique and, again, so beautiful.

For an encore, the band played "A Great day for Freedom". David dedicated this song to "Solidarity" and those who were fighting for freedom these days, to "those who changed the world"...

Then, certainly, there was "Wish you were here" and "Comfortably numb". And that was it.

Leaving the concert, I saw people with tears in their eyes. What an artist! What a guitar!

SHOW REVIEW

By BD contributor, Normunds

After 11 hour drive from Riga, our company arrived in Gdansk on Saturday morning. Weather was terrible - rain. After night drive we went to sleep and when we woke up, there was no rain and after lunch sun came through the clouds.

Show had to start at 9pm and it started exactly on time with unforgettable heartbeats. "Breathe", "Time" and "Breathe reprise" went on. After that David introduced Baltic Philharmonic orchestra and played "On an Island". Of course there were several mistakes and first one was Gilmour's forgotten slide guitar solo lines on Breathe reprise. He took a short break and resumed it. After OAI David played Pink Floyd classic songs.

To me absolute highlight was Echoes - 20 minutes long musical orgasm. Fat old sun was great and even Richard Wright could not spoil Astronomy Domine by singing off-beat. Actually there was a lot of errors - forgotten solo lines, Wright's error on AD, Carin's not plugged in guitar, which spoiled the show.

Having seen both David and Roger I have to say that Water's show was musically way better than Gilmour's. David had better lights. Speaking about lights - I was completely surprised that during second solo on Comfortably Numb, lights went almost out. May be there was some failure too...

Overall show was good, but not excellent.