James Taylor

James Taylor Tanglewood encore How Sweet It Is…

Article updated July 19, 2019 by Dave Read

We got lucky with the end-of-show crowd surge at James Taylor’s July 4, 2014 Tanglewood concert, recording five minutes of fairly steady video to afford a good look at how much fun he is having. Of course, the audio ain’t so hot, but still worth it to catch Lou Marini’s hot sax solo – and related hamming it up!

Hotels in the Berkshires

Find hotels near Tanglewood with user reviews, check amenities, nearby attractions, availability and then book your room reservations at these lodging establishments through our partner, International Hotel Solutions (IHS), the leading provider of secure online hotel reservations.

2019 Tanglewood schedule

The Boston Symphony Orchestra has released the schedule for the 2019 season at Tanglewood, which will be remembered for the opening of the Tanglewood Learning Institute, the four buildings overlooking Seiji Ozawa Hall on the Leonard Bernstein camopus.

Music director Andris Nelsons will be present for the month of July, conducting 13 programs, including the world premiere of a new work by Kevin Puts, The Brightness of Light, based on letters of Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz on July 20, and a concert performance of Wagner’s complete Die Walküre on july 27 and 28.

JT and Yo-Yo on the porch

Article updated July 15, 2019 by Dave Read

This video of James Taylor being accompanied by Yo-Yo Ma on Sweet Baby James, recorded Sept. 15, 2008 on the porch of the Red Lion Inn at Stockbridge, is blowing up the Internet – at least my little piece of it!

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2019 Tanglewood schedule

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 4, 2018

Article updated July 6, 2018 by Dave Read

Something about James Taylor’s Fourth of July concert at Tanglewood felt low-key, but that’s in reference to a dozen or so such, which always rank among the most exciting shows of the year. Our expectations may have been out of whack because his July 4, 2008 show exploded into a celebration of his sixtieth birthday. Maybe now that the ¾ century mark is within shouting distance, seventy is not so big a deal?

My reading of the show doesn’t extend to the usual aspects, such as the favorites-filled setlist of 25 songs, the 218 autographs from the lip of the stage during intermission, nor the revival-like 3 song encore when everybody got into the act, nor his awesome band. I thought he ceded primacy to Mike Landau on Steamroller, which his ace guitarist did not squander, before cutting loose with his own axe-indulgence during a coda that would not quit.

The stagecraft of James Taylor

James Taylor is a master of stagecraft, that aspect of a musician’s duty to an audience that cannot help but color his virtuosity and singing. Stagecraft, a.k.a. patter, is the golden thread a singer weaves through a performance. James Taylor is so good at it sometimes that it steals the show; tonight it was spot-on, meaning that I wouldn’t have noticed it, except that I had an eye out for it.

James Taylor’s Lawn Nation at Tanglewood

The Fourth of July James Taylor concert at Tanglewood is a “bucket list” sort of event; it is a musical performance with social implications elbowing their way to the fore. It is a generational thing, with an abundance of kids running around and no shortage of patrons for whom the metaphorical bucket is the last thing they want to be thinking about. Not annual, but since Mr. Taylor built a house near October Mountain seventeen years ago, there has been at least one James Taylor Tanglewood show almost every year.

Here are snapshots of Lawn Nation, as James Taylor likes to call his Tanglewood audience. The images were made around half past six, July 4, 2018.

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 4, 2018 lawn audience

2018 Tanglewood schedule

The 2018 Tanglewood schedulefeatures a season-long celebration of the centennial of Leonard’s Bernstein’s birth, culminating in the Aug. 25 Bernstein Centennial Celebration hosted by Audra McDonald, with Maestro Andris Nelsons, four guest conductors and soloists Yo-Yo Ma, Midori, and others.

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Tanglewood tickets and box office information

Tickets for the 2018 Tanglewood season available through Tanglewood’s website, www.tanglewood.org, SymphonyCharge at 888-266-1200, and at the Symphony Hall Box Office at 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston MA.

Getting around the Tanglewood campus

The Tanglewood campus, summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Tanglewood Music Center comprises several hundred acres in the towns of Lenox and Stockbridge. It is the location of the Koussevitsky Music Shed and Ozawa Hall, where hundreds of thousands attend concerts and a variety of events, including picnics. We always advise new visitors to arrive early and take their daily walking exercise wandering the beautiful Tanglewood grounds. This dynamic map of the Tanglewood grounds includes photos and information for such points of interest as Aaron Copland Library, Highwood Manor House, The Glass House, and The Lion’s Gate.

James Taylor’s 4th of July concert at Tanglewood

July 4, 2016 Tanglewood concert review by Dave Read

James Taylor, whose public attachment to such establishment organizations as the Boston Red Sox and Boston Symphony Orchestra make him seem like the Hilary Clinton of singer-songwriters, had a Bernie Sanders moment during his Fourth of July concert at Tanglewood. Over the years, whenever he introduced a new song onto his tried and true setlist, he would mollify his adoring audience by telling them that it sounds just like all the rest. This year he sounded vexed, letting his stage persona go right to the edge: “I know you didn’t come here for no goddam new songs.” Whether he was merely freshening a stale old joke, or is feeling pinched by audience expectations, it still was every bit as good a concert as we’ve attended in the Tanglewood series going back two decades.

James Taylor 4th of July 2016 concert at Tanglewood; photo: Dave Read/BerkshireLinks.com.

The one variation in the series was his 2002 appearance with John Williams and the Boston Pops when, after reciting Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait to open the program, he returned with an ad hoc quartet of guitarist John Pizzarelli, Larry Goldings on keyboards, drummer Gregg Bissonette, and Jimmie Johnson on bass, with the Pops in an accompanying role. It was a very entertaining set and it left us thinking he was looking down the road toward shows with an emphasis on singing within a looser, jazzier setting.

Tanglewood’s popular artist series

Coming four days before the BSO’s opening night, this show was the tenth on an outstanding roster of popular artists that began June 17 with Dolly Parton and included Earth, Wind, and Fire, Brian Wilson, Jackson Browne, the penultimate broadcast ever of A Prairie Home Companion, with Garrison Keillor, and Bob Dylan. This show was similar to the one Bob Dylan put on 2 nights earlier in a few respects: each fronts an awesome band, each covers songs written by others, and each crafts a setlist that leaves his fans gasping for breath!

James Taylor’s July 4, 2016 setlist

Something in the Way She Moves
Everyday
Walking Man
Don’t Let Me Be Lonely Tonight
Today Today Today
Country Road
On the 4th of July
Copperline
Carolina in My Mind
(I’ve Got To) Stop Thinkin’ ‘Bout That
Fire and Rain
Shower the People
The Frozen Man
The Promised Land
You’ve Got a Friend
Angels of Fenway
Up on the Roof
Sweet Baby James
Steamroller
Mexico
Your Smiling Face
Encore:
In the Midnight Hour
How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You)
You Can Close Your Eyes

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 4, 2015

July 6, 2015 Article by Dave Read

James Taylor’s concert at Tanglewood July 4, 2015 attracted another sell-out audience that packed the Koussevitsky Music Shed and temporarily converted the sweeping lawn area into the 2nd most populated town in the Berkshires! The Washington, MA resident, frequently misidentified as living in Lenox, was accompanied by the familiar cohort known as his All Star Band, plus wife Kim and son Henry. Everybody lucked out when the weather went from dreary and drizzly to bright and sunny in time for the show.

James Taylor performing at Tanglewood, 7.4.15 (Hilary Scott)

Mr. Taylor released a new album recently, Before This World, his first in 13 years and 17th studio recording overall, which spent a week at the top of the charts! Tonight’s show featured several songs from it – Angels of Fenway, Montana, and Today, Today, Today, each of which received an extra decibel of applause. Angels of Fenway relates his experience of the 2004 Boston Red Sox’ release from the “curse of the Bambino” when they overcame an 0-3 deficit to beat the New York Yankees for their first championship since selling Babe Ruth to the Yankees in 1920.

Beatles sign James Taylor to Apple records 1968

James Taylor and his band performed at Tanglewood on July 4, 2015 (Hilary Scott)

Introducing the other new songs, Taylor said that as is the case with so many of his songs, they too reference his 1968 Apple/Beatles bonanza, when, despite doubts and frustrations, he knew he was “the luckiest guy on the planet.” His demo had gotten the attention of Peter Asher, which led to an audition with the Beatles at the same time as when they were recording the White Album! Since then, he seems to have done all he could to justify that luck, producing a body of work that manifests his sense of gratitude.

Having attended many of the 24 concerts he has performed at Tanglewood, we can attest to his consistent generosity, toward both toward his fans in the audience and his fellow musicians on stage. He always answers a few shouts from the auidience during the set – “thank you, sir, love you, too” – “yup, we’re gonna do that one” holding up the setlist, which today ran to 25 songs, including 3 in the “encore” portion. While the band was offstage during the 20 minute intermission, James taylor stayed busy working the stage rim, signing autographs and mugging for cellphone snapshots.

James Taylor at Tanglewood – July 4, 2015 setlist
Wandering
Secret Of Life
Angels of Fenway
Country Road
Montana
Me and My Guitar
Fool to Care
Carolina In My Mind
Bartender’s Blues
Smiling Face
Fire and Rain
Shed a Little Light
Rio
I Will Follow
Whenever You’re Ready
Steamroller
Today, Today, Today
Before this World
Jolly Springtime
Sweet Baby James
Mexico
How Sweet It Is
Knock On Wood
Sun On The Moon
You and I
Tanglewood tickets:
Box Office: 617-266-1200; 888-266-1200
Website: tanglewood.org

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 4, 2014

Article by Dave Read

As if the ghost of Paul Revere had gotten loose, with a mind to make mischief in the Berkshires, in the days and hours leading up to James Taylor’s 4th of July concert at Tanglewood, a quiet rumor rose to a dull roar that a British were coming – to wit, Sir Paul McCartney would make a special guest appearance.

That would be a reunion of the former Beatle and the first artist signed to the beatles’ Apple records. The anicipation built and built during the concert, as Taylor made 3 or 4 references to his lucky days in London, where he auditioned for McCartney and George Harrison while the Beatles were at work on the White Album. In fact, he began the show with the very audition song Something in the Way She Moves! But it never happened, and I don’t think anybody was disappointed. (McCartney did made an appearance, via video, at Taylor’s 60th birthday celebration here six years ago.)

It was another sold-out Tanglewood gig for Taylor, who appeared fit as a fiddle after taking last year off from touring to concentrate on the latter part of the singer-songwriter job description. He performed one new song tonight that’ll appear on an album eventually – Today, Today, Today. The balance of his typically generous setlist was familiar, including: Handy Man, Fire and Rain, Up on the Roof, Sweet Baby James, You’ve Got a Friend, Buddy Holly’s Everyday. Over the course of the nearly three hour show (including encores), everybody in the band and vocal quartet got the spotlight. Michael Landau, Luis Conte, Walt Fowler, Andrea Zonn, Kate Markowitz, Arnold McCuller, David Lasley, Larry Goldings, Steve Gadd, Lou Marini, Jimmy Johnson. His wife Kim and son Henry joined the vocalists for a couple numbers, too.

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 2 – 4, 2012

by Dave Read.

Tanglewood audience July 4th James Taylor concert. — Tanglewood audience July 4th James Taylor concert; photo: Dave Conlin Read

The Koussevitsky Music Shed at Tanglewood is a holy place in the minds of legions of classical music lovers, sort of a chapel to the cathedral – Symphony Hall in Boston. Over the past decade or so, the BSO has instituted a way to ready the place for the returning congregants, inviting lay ministers Garrison Keillor and James Taylor to hold services that are certain clear the dust from the rafters and get the aisle-wardens, parking-assistants, concessionaires, and ticket-takers into mid-season form.

Keillor, an annual Tanglewood attraction since 2000, can now be counted on to append nearly a whole show of audience sing alongs to his 2 hour live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion. And James Taylor, who has played 40+ times at Tanglewood since 1974, has taken to scheduling little series of shows, often with special guests. This year’s 3 night run included one with Taylor Swift, the young country-pop sensation who was named after him. She appeared late in the first set of the July 2 show for a duet on Fire and Rain, and sang her own hits Ours and Love Story in the 2nd set. Ms. Swift’s entrance caused an eruption of shrieks from the youngsters in the sold-out audience that reminded us of the reception afforded the youngsters from Liverpool when they were introduced by Ed Sullivan in 1964.

Tanglewood lawn scene,July 4th James Taylor concert. — Tanglewood lawn scene,July 4th James Taylor concert photo: Dave Conlin Read

The Beatles get a mention at all James Taylor concerts, when he talks about his luck in getting signed by them to record his first album on their Apple label. The album included Carolina in My Mind with appearance by Paul McCartney and George Harrison, and Something in the Way She Moves, which inspired Harrison to write Something. This season’s version of Taylor’s band was missing singer Arnold McCuller but included long-time collaborator Larry Goldings on keyboards and Dean Parks on pedal steel, each of whom added serious and searing oomph to the proceedings.

We attended the 1st and 3rd show; together the series attracted somewhere in the neighborhood of 53,000 fans. Mr. Taylor is also on the program for the Gala 75 Anniversary concert July 14, which features Boston Symphony, Boston Pops, and Tanglewood Music Center Orchestras, plus special guests John Williams, Keith Lockhart, Andris Nelsons, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Yo-Yo Ma, and Peter Serkin.

James Taylor, Amy Grant, Vince Gill at Tanglewood

July 3 & 4, 2011 concerts reviewed by Dave Read.

Independence Day weekend 2011 is bound to be remembered as the Dawn of the New Millennium of Peace & Understanding because that was when James Taylor leapt across the cultural divide into the arms of Amy Grant and Vince Gill, in front of back-to-back sold-out audiences at Tanglewood. This was a big surprise; we don’t do country at Tanglewood. (Photo: Scott Caltron )

They tried it Fourth of July 2006 with LeAnn Rimes – really good concert, but half-empty Shed. That experience may have factored in to the secrecy leading up to these shows and the fact that the guest performers weren’t announced until the day before the show, well after they had been sold out, even though the date had been made months earlier.

Here’s the shocking news: the two shows were seamless; there were no jolts, nothing at all abrupt in the transitions between the several numbers each of the guests did in the midst of Taylor’s concert routine. It’s all pop entertainment, people, despite the machinations of merchandisers and principalities such as the CMA and the Grammys.

Furthermore, any dissimilarity between and among songs of James Taylor, Amy Grant, and Vince Gill were washed away by the sameness of self-deprecating adulation each evinced for the other headliners on stage.

Amy Grant is a knock-out, plain and simple, wholesomely pretty appearing toward the end of the first set in sexy summer dress with shawl that got lost for the second set both nights as did her shoes! She did her 20 year old Baby Baby to everybody’s delight.

Vince Gill too looked right at home in the Koussevitsky Music Shed, wearing grey slacks and jacket with a black collarless shirt – rather metropolitan. His song Pretty Little Adriana was a highlight of his mini-sets, especially his deft, searing blues guitar playing. No wonder Gill is a regular at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads festival.

James Taylor was no less good, and effusive as always in his regard for his band with whom he worked up a fresh sampling from his ouvre for these shows. Our favorite both nights was Steamroller, delivered in about half the time but with maybe double the oomph of earlier Tanglewood performances. Two or three minutes into it, ace sideman Larry Goldings took the lead on the Hammond B3, then it segued neatly back to Walt Fowler on muted trumpet, before coming front and center for James Taylor and Vince Gill’s guitars. Very cool.

Another highlight for us was some jazzy singing by Taylor – several little riffs that were like the vocal equivalents of guitar solos. They emphasize the joy he takes in his work and make it feel as is he is truly into the current presentation of the song and bringing it to life rather than merely involved in yet another recitation of it.

We sensed that, in his patter this week, Taylor has given additional prominence to his 1968 anointing by the Beatles. As grateful as we are to him for introducing Amy and Vince to us this year, perhaps he’ll be more Beatle-esque next summer and invite to Tanglewood some mixed-up homesick youngster at the dawn of a startling career?

James Taylor with the Boston Pops and John Williams at Tanglewood

July 1, 2011 concert reviewed by Dave Read.

The Boston Pops tuned up for their annual 4th of July concert for hundreds of thousands on the Esplanade in Boston by sharing the bill at Tanglewood on July 1 with James Taylor for a relatively intimate gathering of eighteen thousand souls. Led by laureate conductor John Williams, the Pops had the Koussevitsky Shed stage to themselves for the first half of the program and fairly thrilled the audience with a suite of excerpts from Williams compositions, opening with a fanfare for the city of Boston called Jubilee 350, and including pieces from the movies Far and Away, Cath Me If You Can, and Superman.

The Pops got to display their jazz chops for the Escapades from Catch Me If You Can, which featured an ad hoc sax, vibes, and bass trio that the crowd applauded loudly, especially the solo bass coda that allowed simple notes to reverberate through the Shed with the same force, but maybe more eloquence, as a multi-instrument finale.

After intermission, James Taylor appeared, looking like a tycoon in suit and tie but seeming somewhat like a tyro – displaying an unusual nervousness. Undaunted, he began with an ironic choice in his chosen hometown, Getting to Know You, even whistling some.

But just a few tunes into the set, by the time keyboardist Larry Goldings had taken the lead on Mean Old Man, Taylor seemed completely at ease. Perhaps it took the involvement of his sidemen, Goldings plus Jimmie Johnson and Chad Wackerman on bass and drums, for him to achieve work mode? Whereas the artist named James Taylor is an individual, there’s a performer with the same name who’s hardly ever alone, and who is most comfortable while plying his trade amid peers.

It was an earlier James Taylor Boston Pops John Williams triple bill that set an attendance record of 24,470 which resulted in such traffic snarls that the BSO promised the towns of Lenox and Stockbridge to cap ticket sales at 18,000.

Photos by Mark Connolly.

James Taylor and friends at Tanglewood Ozawa Hall

June 30, 2011 performance; by Dave Read

James Taylor and Friends was the billing for the first of the four James Taylor concerts at Tanglewood during the 2011 season. It attracted a capacity crowd to Seiji Ozawa Hall, where the audience spilled over the rise leaving some members of lawn nation with a better view of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s old place than of Mr. Taylor. Playing second fiddle to the headliner, just barely, was mother nature, who was lauded all night for delivering just the sort of setting June and the Berkshires were meant to be presented in. The video is a glimpse from the lawn showing how the concert can be enjoyed via the mini-jumbotron.

We need to resist the temptation to describe Taylor’s performance as being measured, as one would expect at the outset of a run of four concerts in five days. The concert felt like a recital, which befits the venue and it’s 1,200 seats – intimate in comparison to the 5,100 seat Koussevitsky Music Shed, where the other three concerts will take place. It was a discrete event, featuring everybody’s neighbor and friend, accompanied by his longtime keyboards player and vocal quartet, augmented by wife Kim, whose birthday it was, plus a contingent from the Tanglewood Festival Chorus and BSO cellist Owen Young.

Taylor is as expert with patter as he is with the songs so that an evenings’ performance coheres; without making the audience feel like anything other than peers, Taylor talks about being in the studio with Paul McCartny and George Harrison – in 1968, for heaven’s sake – that’s when for all anybody else knew, the Beatles were rearranging the universe. But James Taylor was auditioning his song “Something in the way she moves,” which not only scored him an Apple Records contract, but also inspired Harrison to write “Something,” which is on everybody’s list of best Beatles songs.

In what may be an indication that more of the audience was from away than is usually the case for a James Taylor Tanglewood concert, the Stockbridge reference in Sweet Baby James aroused not much more than a loud smattering of applause rather than the roar of recognition remembered from earlier shows.