Jan and Toni’s Recap: Danny Gokey at Turner Hall (Milwaukee, WI)

Jan and Toni’s Recap DG’s Milwaukee Turner Hall Concert

CD Release Concert

Saturday, March 6^th, 2010

JAN’S VERSION:

The Plan and Pre Concert

Because Toni was flying in from New York, we knew that we would not forgive ourselves if we were too late to get into the concert or not able to see Danny because we were so far in the back.  So our plan was to be there between 9 and 10 AM.  Well, Toni woke up at 5:15 and was showered by the time I woke up at 6AM.  By 8:30 we were only about 8 people from the very front of the line at Turner Hall!  Hard core Danny fans were already waiting.  The first few had come from Michigan, Tennessee and Minnesota, as well as Wisconsin to experience Danny’s CD release party.  It was probably about 30 degrees F and the front of the building (west) was in deep shadows.  It was pretty chilly.  We set up some chairs and learned who was who on twitter.  Kristie, a huge Danny fan that lives in Milwaukee and lurks at Iheart, joined us within the hour. We occasionally took turns getting out of the line to greet Ihearties that were arriving, stretch our legs, warm up in a car or listen to a MBD song on a car stereo.  When the sun came around the building in late morning, we removed jackets and basked in a beautiful day.  We went in groups to Turner to have lunch–but were told we couldn’t linger because it was an extremely busy day in downtown Milwaukee (a college basketball game at the nearby Bradley Center.)  The day sped by UNTIL about 4PM when are side of the building returned to shadows, the crowd became more anxious and “guests” joined those standing in line and it was clear you couldn’t leave your place in the line anymore.  Somewhere during this last hour, a photographer came by and took pictures of the crowd, including the one of me holding our “I <3 Danny Gokey /Pride of WI “ sign with Ihearties Cori, Latrece, Toni, Cindy, Kristie, Jason, and others.  By 5:40 PM we were more than ready to enter the concert!

Turner Hall

is a beautiful late Victorian stone building with lots of great woodwork, stained glass windows and a ballroom on the top floor.  (Not uncommon for WI in the late 1800’s).  It has a large restaurant and bar on the first floor.  I have no idea what is on the second floor.  The ballroom is on the top floor.  It was standing room only (no seats, except a couple scattered tables around the left edge of the dance floor.)

The  Concert

You’ve seen the videos, so I won’t go into details.  Danny sounded and looked great!  The band was having fun and moving to the music and the energy of the crowd was explosive.  We danced, reached for Danny, cheered, sang and just had a good time.  I didn’t experience any pushing or rude behavior–so this was generally a well behaved, happy crowd.  As you know, Danny sang MBD, Still Believe, Life on Ya, WHTM, WNSGB, Crazy Not To, Back at One—with Danny telling the story about Sophia/D’s engagement and a special recognition of Meagan, Be Somebody, Get Away plus an encore of more Get Away

Turners Balcony

Nearly 1000 people waited to spend 30 seconds with Danny getting an autograph of their CD and exchanging a few words.  Right after the concert, I left the floor area and went to the left balcony to have a great view of the crowd below and to watch others take a few photos (my camera was malfunctioning) . It was fascinating to watch this mob of fans waiting to meet Danny.  At this point, D joined the back balcony and greeted many of the special guests there.  (Kristie had watched and filmed the concert from the left  balcony while Toni and I were on the concert floor, just feet from the stage.) I quickly recognized Danny’s sisters, father, mother, his Dad’s brother, and Danny’s brother Charles.  In fact as Charles was walking by me, I stepped a foot forward and asked “Are  you Charles?”  He stopped, said he was, I told him that I recognized him from Twitter.  He introduced his wife Mary.  I mentioned that I followed him on Twitter and he said “Who, me?  I’m a nobody”.  We laughed and I said that he sure wasn’t a nobody, but that he needed to tweet more often!  His wife seemed really surprised that anyone would follow him.  I believe at this point Toni asked if she could take a picture, Charles was fine with it, but his wife wanted to protect her privacy.  I was just about to ask whether we could look forward to hearing him sing with Danny (I’ve heard that Charles has a great voice) when they were approached by others and he left our area.  Rhonda Gokey (Danny’s mom) looked unbelievably young, slim and very pretty.  Mary and all of Danny’s sisters are very pretty, too.  The crowd started chanting for Danny, so he almost abruptly left the back balcony and headed to his autograph table below.  A huge cheer went up when he entered the concert hall.  We watched Danny interact with the fans and sign autographs from above.

Moving On

After watching the scene for awhile, I realized that I was feeling quite melancholy.  While D was doing everything he could to connect with this sea of fans, I knew that even this large crowd would be replaced by ever larger crowds.  Danny would not be accessible like he has often been on his small concert dates.  I know I am incredibly lucky to have had an opportunity to chat with him at the radio tour in Madison and at Nola’s.  This increasing fame is as it should be.  However, it reminded me of the feeling of pride and sadness I had when my children left for college.  I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way, but I knew that things were changing and my role would be smaller and less personal.  As fans there’s lots we can do, but the bound that all of  have felt for D at IheartDG will have to change as he ascends to the career we all feel he is destined to have.  This realization and the fact that I hadn’t had anything to eat in 9 hours (and my blood sugar was probably crashing) had me just sitting and watching the event from 20 feet up.  Most of my friends know that I’m generally not happy being an observer, so I kicked myself in the butt and told myself to get up and mingle.

Back to the Ballroom

I went downstairs and had an opportunity to greet Brandon Fraley and to congratulate him on the great concert.  I asked him how it felt to perform on American Idol.  He said they were as excited as a bunch of kids.  He also said that Ryan Seacrest interviewed each of the band members.  I asked how they were getting enough sleep during this crazy period. He said they were taking naps to catch up.  I told him I imagined he was sorry that his wife Jamie wasn’t part of the tour.  (She works as a back up singer for Carrie Underwood.) He told me that Jamie is a huge fan of Danny and she wants to sing with Danny whenever her schedule allows. (which explains the Sony Christmas party and her performing at the CRS with Danny.)  He said she encouraged him to be Danny’s keyboardist.

As I was finishing this conversation with Brandon, Ivan came towards us.  At this point, I was back to my outgoing self, and I turned to him and said “Ivan, you guys have made it!” He smiled broadly and I gave him a spontaneous hug.  I asked him how exciting was it to perform on the AI stage? He said it was amazing.  I also asked him about Def Santiago.  He said he was taking care of some business in North Carolina and was hoping to move to Nashville. I said that I had read a tweet from Def that he would be joining them for Sugarland and he said that Def would be trying to catch up.  Ivan said he had to go and spend some time with his wife.  So I finally decided to get to the back of the autograph line.  I won’t go into the details on how the security decided at this point that no one else could get in line anymore.  (Let’s just sum it up with “we worked it out.”) But it did cause some consternation/angry reactions from the remaining fans that had just been milling around instead of standing in the endless autograph line.  The irony is that the fans he sought to cut out of the autograph sessions were almost exclusively long term/twitter/IheartDG  fans that had patiently waited to be at the end of the line.

Meeting Danny in the Line

Toni and I went up to D together (since we had appeared at the Nola’s concert in Rochester NY together, we figured are recognition factor would be greater).  The helper handed Danny our booklets to be signed, he quickly did so and I told him were members of I<3DG and that we had seen him at Nolas in NY.  He said he remembered and smiled at us and with his left hand he clasped my right hand and he took Toni’s had in his left.  He leaned forward and asked if we could get the word out to all the ihearties that he needed us to go out to Itunes (Amazon, too?) and rate and comment on MBD.  We said of course we would get the word out. Danny said that some people were leaving one star and writing negative comments, and he needed our help to get the ratings back up. He said he appreciates all of us at  I<3 and all our support.  By this point D’s “helper” was trying to bring in the next person and Danny gave our hands a little squeeze and he was back to signing more CD booklets.

Does he truly remember us?  All that I can tell you is that I felt recognized and if nothing else, he truly recognizes the devotion of the people at I<3DG.com.  The fact that he asked us to bring back a message the last two times we’ve had the privilege to talk with him seems to verify that he “knows” us.

Almost the End

At this point Kristie, Toni and I decided to seek some food.  What better place then the great fish fry at the restaurant in Turner Hall?  We went downstairs and joined Cindy and Latrece at a table in the front room.  We had noticed that the back room had the coming and goings of Brandon, Ivan and what looked to be Danny’s friends and maybe Sophia’s family.  As Brandon walked by, he stopped and chatted with us for a little while about their crazy schedule.  Who was to walk right by our table but Danny on his way to the backroom!  He said hello to us as he walked by–maybe it was the crazy smiles on our faces…..  We teased about getting “lost” on the way to bathroom and heading into the backroom, but we knew we couldn’t do that because he deserved this time with friends.  As we finished our dinner, we learned from our waiter that Danny had come down 20 minutes after the kitchen had closed for the night and that D couldn’t order any food.  It appeared that his large group had managed to rustle up some food for him, but we all felt so bad that he wasn’t served by the restaurant.

Their group was breaking out and we debated if we could be so bold to ask for a group photo if he walked by our table again.  As Danny and Ivan came by, Toni asked if he would mind a photo with the Iheart gals?  He stopped, smiled and said of course, that he loved the Ihearts, but that he had to be quick because he couldn’t miss his bus, LOL.  Five cameras came out and poor Ivan was stuck trying to work all of our cameras!  Before he left, Danny restated how he needed our help with the ratings and review of MBD.  He remarked how he doesn’t know why he is targeted for the negative attention of some people….And then he was off and we all “fangirled” over our luck in having this last interaction.  What a way to end the night!

The True End

We feel very fortunate to see Danny perform in his home town concert.  It was an amazing time. Danny is right; he has the nicest, most loyal fans.  The vast majority of the people we encountered were super friendly and we were all just plain Ga Ga for Gokey.

We are hoping to have a “reunion” at Danny’s Summerfest Concert!  There’s so much to look forward to for Danny Gokey and his very lucky fans.

TONI’S VERSION

ARRIVAL TO MILWAUKEE
I arrived in Milwaukee Friday evening and Kristie (lurker here) picked me up from the airport, we had dinner together and she drove by neighborhoods that are special to her and she drove by areas of interest by night.  We then met up with Jan (Jannikas) at the hotel and spent a couple hours catching up on what we have been up to and I don’t have to tell you what and whom the talks were mostly about while checking what was the discussion on iheart or postings.

This is when I learned that GAC had actually picked my question for Danny to answer which was “what qualities are you looking for in a woman?” When I submitted that question, I thought to myself, they will never pick that question but I guess I was wrong.  So this really started the excitement for the day to follow but by this time it was past 1AM and if we wanted to get in line early we needed to get some sleep.  I started Saturday with having had just about 4 hours of sleep since I just wanted to get to Turner Hall and start the long hours of waiting in line. Jan and I arrived at Turner Hall around 8:30AM and once we got there we claimed our spot in line with some chairs and shortly after Kristie joined us.

THE WAITING IN LINE experience was very long and I have to let you know that this was my very first time waiting in line for anything for 9 hours or so,  never done the super specials line on black Friday or concert tickets and etc. but looking back at it all now it was so worth it and I now know what a reward there is at the end from doing so. It was such a great experience to meet fans that I only knew them from their twitter names or from iheart posts and catch up with other fans that I previously met the last time I went to Milwaukee for the first Danny event I had ever been to. I will not mention their names since I don’t want to leave anyone out. Awesome feeling to be together again at a Danny event.  We did leave the line a couple of times (it was not a problem leaving since we knew our places in line were safe since Danny fans are good like that and take care of each other) to go sit in the car since it was cold and to listen to Danny’s CD blasting in the car,  later in the day the sun did come out and warmed us and the Milwaukee fans did all agree that when ever Danny comes home the sun comes out but by around 3pm the sun was gone and it became cold again and by the time 5:45PM came around I was numb from being so cold. The line of fans was beyond eyesight and we heard that 350 people were not able to get inside.

THE CONCERT was amazing full of high energy and interacting with the audience as you can see from the videos that I took (there is very little that I did not record).  I could have had the choice to go sit at the tables on the upstairs level but I decided to stay within the crowd and be really close to the stage and stand for another 1 hour or so and it was so worth the standing.  Danny came out and started with My Best Days Are Ahead Of Me and he sang a total of 9 songs.  As you hear from the videos the audience’s response was overwhelming and you could tell that Danny was having a lot of fun on stage.

AFTER THE CONCERT I just wanted to sit down and so I went upstairs and sat at one of the tables looking down on how the autograph line was forming. I wasn’t there not even 5 minutes that I looked behind me and there he was Danny walking right by the table I was sitting at and going towards an area where there were radio personalities, special guests, family so as he walked past the table where I was sitting I did say “Hi Danny” he looked and gave that awesome smile of his but I did not have the camera ready.  I walked nearby where he went to but not too close since it looked like it was sort of a brief private gathering and he was taking pictures with some guests but from a distance I did take some pictures and then he went out the doors to go down and sit at the autograph table.

AUTOGRAPHS I am amazed that this was even possible for him to sign all those autographs and I believe it took him about close to 2 hours to sign all of them.  I positioned myself upstairs in an area where I could take some pictures.  As the line got smaller Jan, Kristie and I decided to join the line but just as we entered the line a security guard decided to cut the line right in front of us and we were the only ones left (so I guess it is not always good to go last remember that) I pleaded with the guy a little but I saw he was being firm about his decision so we sort of stepped out of line but then these 3 other younger girls (we labeled them as the “future cougars”) who were also not in line and had decided to rest on the floor were told they could not get in line for the autographs when we were outside they were right after us and had arrived at around 9AM.  Another fan had stepped out of line so that a 9 year old little girl could take her place in line to have her autograph but you could tell she was upset since she too had waited in line all day and had come from Maryland just for the concert.  When the security guy walked away other fans told us to just mix in with the rest of them and so we did and we all got our autographs too (all Danny fans are great people!).

When our turn came Danny was full of smiles and very sweet, I am still a little foggy o all the details since it happened so quickly but I do remember him holding my hand and he asked us to bring a message to Iheart of keep rating and posting comments for My Best Days on Itunes.

TURNER HALL RESTAURANT

As Jan, Kristie and myself left the concert hall we were starving and so we decided to go downstairs to the restaurant and have dinner by this time it was almost 10pm.  In the restaurant we found Latrece and New Cindy having dinner so we joined them at their table and we ordered food and we talked about the concert and how they liked it.  We noticed that there was a good possibility that the band members and friends and family were having dinner in the next room.  Brandon walked by and he stopped at our table and we started talking to him and he was very friendly and answered some of our questions and he said that he keeps track of only 2 days ahead of where they are going and that there would be TV promotions coming up. At one point we were all eating and down the
stairs all by himself comes Danny as he walks past our table says “Hi guys”  we all said Hi back and we didn’t dare stop him since we knew he must have wanted to join the party and have dinner finally. Shortly after we did see people going over to his table wanting to take pictures and he did take pictures with them.  We later found out from our waiter who was also serving the party that by the time Danny came down, the kitchen had already closed. So we continued with our dinner very slowly and we were just sitting there.  I don’t have to tell you that we were waiting to see Danny leave so when that time came I was the bold one and asked him if he would please take a group picture with us and he so kindly said yes and he stretched out his arms to all of us and  then Ivan took a picture with each of our cameras.  We all made small talk with Danny and he asked if we were all from ihearts and we said yes and he said “I love all ihearts”, Danny loves all his fans and he said again to bring back to you all the message to keep posting and rating on itunes.  We left the restaurant still in awe and glad that this totally unexpected event of 5 minutes or so happened.

DEPARTURE FROM MILWAUKEE
Sunday morning we slept in a little longer.  Kristie took Jan and I on a tour of Milwaukee and we saw the Summerfest grounds which could be a potential return trip to Milwaukee for me in late June for another Danny concert.  I took lots of pictures of the lake and
beautiful buildings Kristie brought us to. Then we were off to the airport only to find out that Meaghan and her precious dog Whitney
were on the same flight that I was.  I was able to switch my seat and sit next to her and continue our Danny talk about his dedication song to her which was very emotional for all.  Meaghan is a beautiful girl and Whitney is an excellent guide dog.
What a sweetie Danny is! Now I wait for the May Sugarland concerts.