In the words of a young twenty something woman who describes her self as Chayanne's biggest fan, what you experience at his concerts can only be called "Musical Hysteria". It's not just the exhilarating rhythms and dancing numbers which are plenty, or the good looking dancers which include two beautiful women and four handsome male dancers, it's not the always smiling keyboardist or the mischievous guitar players, who look on the crowd knowing that what is happening on stage is magic. It's not only the thousands and thousands of screaming fans, mostly women ranging from their early twenties to that age which you are not supposed to ask about anymore. These women, who often are accompanied by their husbands or boyfriends are the active participants of that "Musical Hysteria" that make up a Chayanne show.
In the opening weekend of what is to become Chayanne's World Wide "No Hay Imposibles" Tour, 20,000 plus fans came out strong during the three shows to support an artist that 100% of his fans describe in the following way: wonderful, tender, amazing, humanitarian, real, down to earth, handsome, beautiful.... these among the adjectives that can be written in this blog.
The first stop was L.A.'s historic (and very accommodating) Gibson Amphitheater. The venue which is grand but cozy is one of Los Angeles' mecca of contemporary performances. The backstage halls are lined up with framed pictures of artist who have sold out the Amphitheater at one time or another, and many of CMN's good friends line up the walls: Ana Gabriel in a majestic turquoise suit is up there, along with father and son tandem Alejandro and Vicente Fernandez, Mr. "Spanish Frank Sinatra" Luis Miguel is there as well next to Mariah Carey, and further down the hallway pass the frame of the children's musical act the Wiggles (who sold out the amphitheater in several occasions) is a frame that changes every week, sometimes every night. It is a tradition at the Gibson that the artist who performs in each night's show has their picture framed next to the legendary dressing room A, and this time for two nights in a row the man in the framed picture was the cause of the all the screaming fans waiting for him to come out.
"The Chayanne Experience", said a scantly dressed woman in a tight black dress is "his moves, his dancing, how he makes me feel inside"; her husband who stood next to her looked at me smiling awkwardly, listening to his wife talk about another man. Her delight soon turned to complete euphoria as the lobby lights began flickering signaling that the show was about to begin, "I gotta' go" she said, "I cant miss the beginning, it was nice to meet you" and then she ran off leaving her husband walking quickly behind her. When the lights inside the Amphitheater went out, the screams were so deafening that they melted into a long high-pitched omnipresent scream that seem to bother no one. As the familiar notes of one of Chayanne's famous songs began to play I suddenly felt as though all the women standing behind me were going to rush the stage and run me over, I looked back just in case that my worst fear may come true but they did not seem to notice that I was there: their view was fixed on the lasers and lights on stage, waiting for the cause of all the screaming to finally appear. The beat sped up, the notes strung longer, the dancers took their places and then in a nano second of quiet delirium, Chayanne appeared making me feel as though I would soon go deaf. Some women bagan to to cry, some men began to dance: Chayanne and his ubiquitous magnetism was about to put the "EXPERIENCE" into full force.
