Madam, - Being a singer in Denmark, and having been inspired by Barbra Streisand for 40 years, seeing her perform live was something I had long wished for. I invested in the most expensive ticket I have ever bought in my life, an air ticket to Ireland, and found a place to stay.
Two days before I flew to Ireland, I received an e-mail from Ticketmaster, "reminding" the audience that the concert would take place outdoors. There had been no mention of that fact when I bought the ticket, so this was a shock. Everyone knows that it rains in Ireland, and that outdoor concerts never produce a good sound.
As to the concert: of course it rained. First, we all got stuck for hours in traffic. The parking was a muddy catastrophe. We had been reminded that cameras were not allowed, but there was no real security check when I arrived.
The venue was muddy and the ground was covered partly in slippery plastic. Many people just sat where they felt like, leaving many of us no option but to sit in a seat inferior to that for which we had paid dearly. Half of the audience arrived hours ahead of time, leaving them too much time to drink too much.
When the concert finally started, about an hour late, the audience was tired. The rain came and went, the sound was poor, and since the concert started before sunset, the sun shone brightly on the plastic shielding the back part of the stage, reflecting back to the audience, so many of us could not see Ms Streisand at all.
Between songs, many in the audience talked, answered their phones (the management did not remind people to turn them off), drank beer and wandered about, some taking flash photographs.
Ms Streisand didn't have a chance in the world to give her utmost. I'm surprised she didn't walk off the stage and refuse to sing.
In the second half, as it got darker, there was a bit more concentration from the audience. The stage lighting started being visible.
After the concert, the nightmare continued. Cars couldn't get out, there was mud everywhere, and those of us without cars had no option but to join a crowd of many thousands on foot, trying to get home. In the crowd - once you were in it, you couldn't get out again - we inched our way down an unlit path, through mud and darkness, for over an hour, until we finally arrived in Celbridge, where there of course were no buses the first hour. I got back to Dublin around 2am, with a feeling that I had never really got to hear or see Barbra Streisand.
I feel badly treated, extremely disappointed and very angry. I want my money back! And I expect a serious apology from the concert management. - Yours, etc,
BIRGITTE BRUUN, Copenhagen, Denmark.