Bob Dylan avoids controversy during his first-ever gig in China
April 7th, 2011 - 6:12 pm ICT by ANILondon, Apr 7 (ANI): Singer Bob Dylan has managed to avoid controversy during his first-ever gig in China.
Dylan, 69, “charged through” his set list, according to one person at the gig, leaving out any banter with the audience between the songs and only introducing his five-piece band after 90 minutes and the first encore.
The Chinese Communist party had requested 2,000 of the 18,000 seats at Beijing’s Workers’ Gymnasium.
Dylan left out some of his more famous protest songs, such as ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’ and ‘The Times they Are a-Changin’.
Many observers had expected Dylan to shock the mostly Chinese audience, perhaps by making a political statement or by voicing support for Ai Weiwei, the Chinese artist who has not been heard from since police escorted him from Beijing airport last Sunday.
“It would have been a total disaster if he had said anything, this was a really high-profile event,” the Telegraph quoted Archie Hamilton, a music promoter in China, as saying.
He recalled the near two-year ban on foreign acts that the Communist Party imposed after the Icelandic singer Bjork made a plea for Tibet at the end of a concert in Shanghai in 2008.
Dylan had only been granted permission to perform to tour in China early last month, leaving organisers scrambling to sell tickets in Beijing and Shanghai. (ANI)
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