|
On April 30th 2005 Ruth and I hosted a dinner for fans
of André Rieu
attending the May 1st concert in Dallas.
The dinner was a great success, all attending had a
wonderful time,
and many new friendships were made that
night.
Ruth and I will try to tell you how it all came
about.
It all began with an inspired idea by Ruth:
[Ruth] I asked
Lawrence if he would like to plan a Fan Dinner in
Dallas with me, and his answer was yes. Prior to
André Rieu’s first
North American concert tour in November 1997, I attended
a fan dinner in Toronto. Other fans who had also made
pledges for tickets to the concert as well as dinner met
at the restaurant and André
stopped by to talk to us and have a photo taken with
each couple. I thought it would be a great idea to plan
another dinner in Dallas. I had attended a fans dinner
prior to a Helmut Lotti concert as well and had a
great time meeting other fans.
[Lawrence] To take
this great idea and turn it into reality required a lot
of planning. At the outset several decisions had to be
made. First, and obviously, we had to establish a time,
and secondly we had to establish a place. The time was
easy: it seemed only logical to host a dinner on the
evening of the day before the concert. That required the
proposed event to be held on the Saturday evening before
the Sunday concert. Establishing a starting time of
6:00pm was a no-brainer. Selecting a place was more
complicated, however. In general we agreed that we
should try to find a restaurant that was convenient to
our guests, many of whom would be from out-of-town, and
which would be located on a major street that was both
easy to get to and also convenient to the hotel at which
several of the guests (including Ruth and her
husband Jim) were staying.
[Ruth] Since I was
staying at the Marriott near the DFW Airport, I first
called to inquire about reserving a banquet room for our
dinner. It turned out to be very expensive, so I decided
to search the Internet for a convenient restaurant with
a banquet room. I found a perfect restaurant, Marsala
Ristorante, with a French/Italian menu that would appeal
to everyone and wasn’t too expensive. I also acquired a
Texas Tour Book from AAA, and found that the restaurant
was rated very well. I then called the owner and
tentatively reserved the banquet room. Before committing
to this choice, I contacted Howard Andrews,
Lawrence’s brother-in-law, who lives near the
Marsala. He told me that he had eaten there, and he also
went over to check it out. He told me that it would do
nicely. I then put a refundable deposit on the room and
reserved it for the date and time of our Fan Dinner. Of
course, I informed Lawrence to get his impression
and his OK.
Lawrence and Sally Chaney, the webmaster
of www.andrerieufans.com, posted messages in
André’s guestbook,
Sally’s guestbook and the Yahoo fan group to
advertise our dinner plans, and requested that fans
interested in attending the dinner contact me by email
if they would like to make a reservation. I replied with
an invitation with the details and a map of the
restaurant’s location. We had a total of 20 fans attend
the dinner, including guests from the Dallas area,
Tucson, Houston, Shreveport, California and Lake Tahoe.
Well before the dinner, I ordered a few items from
André’s boutique to
give as door prizes, Sally contributed a few
more, and Lawrence printed many JSO roster
booklets too. I also created buttons for each guest with
a photo of André and
the Texas state flag with Dallas and the date inserted
in the flag. At the dinner, Lawrence also
provided a CD player and André
Rieu CDs to play at
the dinner. We also went around the table, and each
dinner guest told their story about how they became a
fan and how long it has been, and whether they had
attended any concerts. Best of all, Lawrence set
up his camera on a tripod, organized everyone for a
group photo, shot the picture with his digital camera,
and printed copies for everyone on the spot.
It was a wonderful get together with fellow fans that
had never met in person, but only by email or by
telephone. Now, we are all great friends, and we hope to
have a similar Fan Dinner before another one of
André Rieu’s
concerts in the future.
click photo to enlarge
~ click arrows to navigate slide show
[Lawrence] Ruth’s
buttons were a big hit with our dinner guests. Several
of the guests attended the meet-and-greet after the
concert and Andre
noticed the buttons that they wore and said, "I know
him" while pointing at the button. He also autographed
some of the JSO
rosters that were given as door prizes at the dinner.
After the dinner was over and the guests had left, I had
a semi-inspired idea: Why not host an
André Rieu Fans
Tailgate Party in the parking lot of the Nokia theater
before the concert the next evening? I talked with
Ruth and she agreed that another get-together with
our new friends would be fun. Ruth assumed the
job contacting everyone and inviting them to the party.
My wife Pauline with her sister Patricia,
and our friend Sarah got together and planned the
menu.
[Pauline] We had
been told that parking might be a problem, so we knew we
had better arrive at the theater early. Lawrence
suggested that we have a tailgate party while we waited
for the concert to begin. My sister, Patricia, a
Grand Prairie resident, offered to help. She happens to
make the world’s best meatloaf and suggested we serve
meatloaf sandwiches and her scrumptious Symphony Bar
Brownies. Sarah and I shopped Sunday morning for all the
extras to go with it – buns, lettuce, chips & dip, and
paper products. Howard supplied ice and soft
drinks. We served it from the back of our SUV complete
with the André Rieu
Fan Dinner banner that Ruth had made for the
dinner the evening before. We really didn’t know exactly
how many would show up, but we prepared for all 20. As
it happened, only 12 of us gathered for our little
party, but we had a great time together. We were all so
excited about getting to finally hear and see
André and the
orchestra, most of us for the first time. We exchanged
e-mail addresses and Patricia shared her meatloaf
and brownie recipes. Then it was time to pack up and
make our way into the theater for the event we’d been
anticipating for months.
click photo to enlarge
~ click arrows to navigate slide show
[Lawrence] And then,
it was SHOWTIME! And our story is ended, but, perhaps
not. We hope that it will be continued next year when
(if?) André returns
with his wonderful JSO
to Dallas and/or Houston during another North American
tour. You can bet that there will be another fan dinner
and tailgate party, even bigger and better.
See you there,
Ruth,
Lawrence, and Pauline
|
.jpg)
.jpg)
