Amy Grant/Vince Gill "The 12 Days of Christmas"

 Amy Grant and I go back a long, loooooong way.  It’s hard to believe that she’s in her early 50’s (like me) but yet looks like she’s still 16 (unlike me).  My daughter and I got to go to her and her hubby's (Vince Gill) “ The 12 Days of Christmas” concert last night in Roanoke, VA.  This is my second time seeing her in concert.  This is my daughter Elise’s first time and it’s been a long time coming.  Throughout the this post, I will have pictures from last night concerts.  They all pretty much look the same, except that the backdrop is in different colors.  In some you can see Amy and Vince in some just barely, sorry about the quality, I converted from a bberry to an ip.  Must say, bberry's camera was much better quality.

"Tender Tennessee Christmas"

I grew up in El Paso, Texas.  I attended the local Baptist church which was back then, the largest Baptist church in the city of almost 350,000 back in the early 70’s, which is also where hubby and I met.  When we were first engaged in the early 80’s, he started to move some of his stuff into my apartment, a big load consisted of music albums.  Albums galore! “yeeesh” I thought to myself, “this guy really likes music”.  Come to find out he was a member of one of those music clubs where you can start off your membership with 10 album selections for only .99₵.  Remember those?  These music clubs had in their clause something about sending selections of “their” choice.  If you liked it  you kept it if not, then you could send it back.  Anyway, I saw that hubby had an album that he hadn’t even opened yet (telling me he wasn’t interested) and for some reason it caught my eye.  Maybe it was because the front cover had a picture of a young girl around my age, compare to all the other albums he had which were “older” folk, southern gospel groups which I’m not very fond of although I may listen to a Gaither song here and there.   Checking out the titles of the songs on this album of the pretty young girl, “My Father’s Eyes”, “Fairytale”, “Always the Winner”, etc.,  got me curious so I decided to open and listen to it thus beginning my admiration of not only her voice and style of music, but the songs she sang of her “Prince” and Lord, Jesus.  I was a young mother, wife and the songs she sang encouraged me in my newfound faith which gave me reassurance, hope and I admit, a skip in my step.  As Amy continued to grow in the business and as each album was released be rest assured, I had it in my collection.  One day in said church, it was a Sunday evening service which was more relaxed and laid back, some of the youth girls were talking with others just before the service started and I noticed one of them had a t-shirt on of Amy’s “Unguarded” concert tour.  Apparently this young girl attended that concert and I was proud of myself for recognizing it and at the same time envious that she got to go see Amy sing. I was determined back then that I would make it a point to attend an Amy Grant concert someday.  It wasn’t until we lived in upstate New York that Amy came to Geneva, NY about an hour away from where I lived.  My good friend Sue and I went and I was so thrilled that I finally got to see Amy.

Fast forward about twenty years, early Fall 2011 there’s a commercial on tv advertising the Amy Grant/Vince Gill “12 Days of Christmas Concert” coming to Roanoke in December!!  I immediately texted my daughter to tell her and I believe her reply was, “EEEEEEEEEEK!!!!”.  Tickets for the concert were purchased as soon as they were on sale and the countdown began.  The day arrived, and with Roanoke being a little over an hour away, and on our way there, every now and then I would glance at Elise with a big “EEEEEEK” smile and she would smile back with her “EEEEEEEK” smile too.  Can you tell we were excited?   How fun to go to a concert with my young adult daughter.  A moment I will cherish forever.  She admits that she heard Amy Grant while still in the womb. Hmmmm, I wonder if there's any truth to that?

Pre-Concert Picture

The stage backdrop was lit up with of a row of blue Christmas trees and silver lights.  Faux snow was on the ground embedded with musical instruments, microphone stands and chairs, ready to go – let’s get this show started!

Amy sang a lot of her songs from the several Christmas releases she has out,  all the while dressed so elegantly.  She changed into three different outfits.  My favorite one was the one I called her “Mrs. Claus” outfit.  It was so adorable and like I said elegant.  I don’t know anything about styles but it kinda reminded me of the type of combination jacket/skirt Jacqueline Onassis would wear.  It was a Christmas red, two piece outfit.  Long sleeves with the ends white faux fur, thick and plush, simply gorgeous and as she walked out on stage in that outfit, Vince called her his “beautiful, baby doll”.  So cute.  What’s more amazing is that she mentioned that she found the outfit up in their attic and that it belonged to her grandmother.  WOW!!  The whole audience simultaneously said, “awwwwww”.  

Here she is in her beautiful "Mrs. Claus" outfit

The most moving part after she told us how precious her mom was to her, told a story or two about her mom and that this would be the first Christmas without her.  I knew that her mom had passed away this past year but had forgotten about it until she mentioned it.  My throat started to hurt and eyes welled up with tears as I’m sure everyone else’s in the audience.  That first Christmas without that loved one is always the hardest.  I’d say the whole first year.  But life goes on and I’m sure our loved ones who have gone on would want us to move on.  Amy then followed with her song, “Heirlooms”.

I believe she's singing "Heirlooms" in this one.  Here's she's wearing a beautiful purply/iridescent gown .  I'm convinced she can wear a burlap sack and make it look good.

We had a wonderful time at the concert.  What a way to spend the holiday season, I wish she would come every year!  We would make it a tradition.  Or maybe we could make a trip out to Nashville and make that a tradition.  Wouldn’t that be fun?

At the end of the concert singing "Emmanuel"

I rambled on.  I guess all I could’ve just said was that I went to a Christmas concert last night and thoroughly enjoyed it but what fun would that have been?!!