Poignant farewell for music legend

By Jim Harrington

jharrington@bayareanewsgroup.com

ROHNERT PARK » It was an emotional evening for the fans who filled Weill Hall to capacity on Sunday to see Joan Baez in concert.

You could hear it their voices as they sang along with the folk music hero. You could see it in their eyes, which lit up the moment the star took the stage and remained laser-focused on the singer throughout the evening. And you could definitely feel it in the air, as the fans showered this Rock & Roll Hall of Famer with the respect and adoration she has earned over a career that stretches some 60 years.

As hard as it is for some to believe — and even harder for some to accept — Joan Baez has announced her plans to retire from the road. So, what we were witnessing at the lovely Weill Hall, located at the Green Music Center at Sonoma State University, was part of the 77-year-old music legend’s farewell tour.

It was the first of several concerts the star is performing in the Bay Area. She is scheduled to perform at 8 tonight at The Masonic in San Francisco ($59.50-$89.50, www.livenation.com) and 8 p.m. Saturday and 7:30 p.m. Sunday at the Fox Theater in Oakland ($55-$125.50, www.ticketmaster.com).

Baez — who says she may still perform occasionally after this trek ends — is one of many well-known artists who are retiring from the road. Other acts that have been on, or are about to embark on, the farewell circuit include Bob Seger, Paul Simon, Elton John, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Slayer, Ozzy Osbourne and Kiss.

Baez’s retirement, however, stings at least as bad as any of the others. Part of that has to do with her Northern California connection, since she has lived in Woodside for decades. But, more important, we desperately need Joan Baez in 2018.

Listen to enough Maroon 5 and and you start to forget that music can make a real difference — that it can stand for something, help bring change and be the soundtrack for a better tomorrow.

Baez stands as the very necessary reminder of all that. Following in the footsteps of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, she is the rare artist who is known as much for her beliefs and activism as for her music.

Sunday’s concert served as a great summary of Joan Baez’s amazing career.

She took the stage alone and opened the concert with a cover of “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” by Bob Dylan, a songwriter who might well be selling shoes for a living today if Baez hadn’t introduced his music to the masses in the early ’60s.

“You’ll hear a healthy dose of Bob Dylan tonight, because he wrote the best stuff we’ve got,” Baez told the crowd.

She’d soon follow with a sobering take on Dylan’s “It Ain’t Me Babe,” but she’d also showcase her nearly unparalleled skills as an interpreter of others’ songs by covering many other great writers. She’d deliver a couple of cool Tom Waits cuts — “Last Leaf” and “Whistle Down the Wind,” the latter being the title track to Baez’s most recent album, which is her first studio offering in 10 years.

She’d also do a Woody Guthrie number, dedicating a sympathetic rendition of the great songwriter’s harsh critique on the treatment of migrant workers — “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)” — to immigrants and refugees.

Where’s there’s Guthrie, there’s often Seeger. So, it didn’t come as much of a surprise when Baez later trotted out the Seeger favorite “Darling Corey.”

Yet the best cover of the night may well have been Baez’s touching version of John Prine’s lonely “Hello in There,” which further illustrated why Prine deserves to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2019.

Baez finished the main set with “Gracias a la Vida” before joining arms with her bandmates at center stage. Just then Jimi Hendrix’s combative take on “The Star-Spangled Banner” began playing over the sound system, leading the star and her crew to “take a knee” in front of the audience.

It was a bold political/ social statement — especially given that it came in the midst of Veterans Day weekend — but the fans seemed to approve, cheering even louder as Baez did her best Colin Kaepernick imitation.

Joan Baez, seen in concert Sunday at Weill Hall at Sonoma State University, takes her farewell tour to San Francisco tonight and Oakland on Saturday and Sunday.

COURTESY OF WEILL HALL