(ENGLEWOOD, NJ) -- New shows on sale this week at the Bergen Performing Arts Center (bergenPAC) include Oscar D’Leon in November; Melissa Etheridge’s Holiday Trio in December; The Elvis Birthday Bash in January, 2017; Colin Hay in January, 2017; and The Pink Floyd Experience in February 2017. Tickets go on sale Friday, August 19, 2016 at 11:00am at www.ticketmaster.com or by calling bergenPAC’s Box Office at 201.227.1030.
Oscar D’Leon
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2016 at 8:00pm; Tickets range from $39 - $129
Salsa Superstar Oscar D’León. “EL GIGANTE DE LA SALSA” brings his unique, vibrant, and contagious performance that will move the crowd. Oscar’s energetic hits include Mi Bajo y Yo, Detalles, Yo Quisiera, Sientate Ahi, Hechicera, Taboga, Calculadora and many more of your favorite songs will make an electrifying night to remember.
His skill at improvisation is combined with a highly textured vocal tone by Venezuela-born Oscar D’León. Influenced by Cuban musicians including Beny Moré and la Sonora Mantacera and by New York-based Latin performers including Eddie Palmieri and Willie Colón he taught himself to play bass by listening and playing along to records.
Oscar D’León is a top-ranked performer in his homeland and throughout the world. A joy for entertaining has been a constant thread throughout D’León’s career.
Melissa Etheridge’s Holiday Trio
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 10, 2016 –at 8:00pm; Tickets range from $39 - $129
Melissa Etheridge has been a core Island Records artist since the release of her critically-acclaimed self-titled RIAA double-platinum debut album. For several years, Etheridge’s popularity built around such memorable songs as “Bring Me Some Water” (from her debut), “No Souvenirs” (from Brave And Crazy) and “Ain't It Heavy” (from Never Enough), for which she won her first Grammy for Best Female Rock Vocal.
Etheridge hit her commercial and artistic stride with her fourth album, Yes I Am, featuring the massive hits “I’m the Only One” and “Come to My Window,” a searing song of longing that brought her second Best Female Rock Grammy. The album went six times platinum and spent more than two and a half years on the album chart. Her highest charting album, Your Little Secret (#6 on the Billboard Top 200), included the hit single, “I Want to Come Over.” Her astounding success led Etheridge to receive the Songwriter of the Year honor at the ASCAP Pop Awards in 1996, and the Academy Award for Best Original Song in 2007.
The Elvis Birthday Bash
FRIDAY, JANUARY 13, 2017 at 8:00pm; Tickets range from $39 - $49
Finally a show that shifts the focus away from the smoke and mirrors associated with Elvis tribute shows….back to what it is all about: The GREAT MUSIC!
The concept of the “Premier Elvis Bash” began two decades ago when audiences wanted something more than the typical Elvis tribute show. Two of the most highly respected Elvis performers in the world were asked to share the stage for authentic Elvis rock n’ roll. Audience feedback was immediate and overwhelming, with fans traveling for hours to catch the show. Twenty consecutive years later, the fans are still raving.
There is certainly no shortage of Elvis shows or Elvis impersonators. The Elvis that true fans remember could sing “It’s a Wonderful World” and make you cry. He was a man who took his love for gospel and shared it through his rock n roll. He had the magnetism of a superstar, but the sensitivity of a true artist.
Scot Bruce performs as Elvis, the way we remember him during his early career, followed by Mike Albert, who is superb as Elvis in his Vegas years. Together, they transport audiences far, FAR beyond the usual, overly produced Elvis shows to recreate the electrifying musical excitement of the King, in these gripping yet authentically based concerts. These performers are each one of the elite in the genre. It is rare that one gets to look deeper than the caricaturist-type portrayals that have become the vogue, but these two master performers deliver an Elvis experience with superb reverence and a purity that will give you chills.
Colin Hay
THURSDAY, JANUARY 19, 2017 at 8:00pm; Tickets range from $29 - $49
Colin Hay is familiar to millions as the frontman, songwriter, and vocalist of pop sensation Men at Work (“Down Under,” “Overkill,” “Who Can it Be Now?”). Hay is justifiably proud of his place in pop history, but since moving to Los Angeles in 1989, he’s made 11 critically-acclaimed solo albums, including the highly successful Man at Work, and has recently announced the release of his new album Next Year People on Compass Records.
Next Year People is the work of an artist who is a true master of his craft. The album is full of quizzical, curious, and cynical yet open-hearted songs with catchy melodic hooks that underscore deeply insightful lyrics.
Over the past 15 years, Hay has reinvented himself as a solo artist, regularly selling out theaters and listening rooms across the US and around the world and introducing himself to a new generation of fans in the process. The frequent use of Hay’s music in TV and film-including hit shows such as Scrubs (on which he made several cameo appearances), Army Wives and Modern Family, the hit soundtrack to the film Garden State and the recently released Words and Pictures-has proven the timeless appeal of his song.
The Pink Floyd Experience
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2017 at 8:00pm; Tickets range from $29 - $69
Without Question, Pink Floyd remains one of the most influential rock bands of all time. PFX - The Pink Floyd Experience (PFX) is described as a full on sensory assault celebrating the music, the themes, and the innovation that this great band brought to fans around the world. In keeping with this tradition, PFX is equipped with 6 outstanding musicians, interpretive videos, plane crashes, the flying pig, and bulb man– it’s all there, LIVE! Touring for more than 10 years, this is the show for the ultimate Floyd Fan, and it gets closer to the true Pink Floyd concert experience every year!
The icons that Pink Floyd made their own have all been incorporated into PFX. From live visual and sound effects of plane crashes, helicopters, and cash registers in Money, fans are left wanting more. Audiences will have the chance to close their eyes and take it all in while hearing some of Pink Floyd’s greatest hits including such favorites as “Money,” “Wish You Were Here,” and “Comfortably Numb.”
Some Floyd Facts: More than 200-million albums have been sold since 1967 with four Grammy nominations in the '70s, '80s, and '90s. They were one of the first bands to use pyrotechnics, video, and light shows in their stage acts. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996. ”Dark Side of the Moon” broke all chart records when it stayed on the Billboard Top 200 Album charts for 741 weeks. It stayed there from 1973 to 1988. Nearly 1,000,000 Pink Floyd catalog albums are sold each year worldwide.
Tickets available at: www.ticketmaster.com or Box Office (201) 227-1030. bergenPAC is located at 30 North Van Brunt Street in Englewood, NJ.
Photo of Mike Albert by Debbie Andrews.
