Rodeo Festival of Watches and Jewelry 2014 Kick Off event with Chris Botti
Sep 16, 2014,00:01 AM
The 2nd annual
Rodeo Drive Festival of Watches and Jewelry kicked-off on Sunday evening
with a concert featuring Grammy Award winning trumpeter Chris
Botti. The PuristSPro Team joined the festivities on
the famed Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. The weather during
the day was scorching hot but perfect during the late evening.
The stage was set on Rodeo Drive between Brighton Way and Dayton Way
but the event actually started earlier in the afternoon with a private
party in the penthouse of the Luxe Hotel.
BMW
was on site with the debut of the new i8 plug-in hybrid sports car and
the 5-door hatchback i3.
The
event was sponsored by GenLux magazine, The Rodeo Drive Committee and
The City of Beverly Hills. The festival itself runs all week
and will also feature an open house later in the week on
Thursday. More than 10 boutiques will be hosting private
events including a golf putting challenge at Richard Mille and
showcasing two celebrity timepieces the RM38-01 Tourbillon G Sensor
Bubba Watson, and the RM 19-01 Tourbillon Natalie Portman. Bulgari will
debut their Lvcea ladies watches. The Tourbillon Boutique,
Westime Beverly Hills, Breguet, Jaeger LeCoultre and several other
brands will be hosting more events during the week.
Trumpeter Chris Botti is well known and is
the largest selling American instrumental artist and has received
multiple gold, platinum and Grammy awards. While we were
seated and waiting for the concert to start, we were seated next to
another couple that were huge jazz fans. I learned a lot of
information from them, and was intrigued by the fact that Chris Botti
plays his music with a Martin Committee large-bore Handcraft trumpet
made in 1939 and uses a No. 3 silver-plated mouthpiece from Bach made in
1926. He also uses a Leblanc Vacchinao Harmon mute from the
1950's. Initially I didn't quite understand what or how the
pieces worked on the trumpet, but it was funny to hear the story told by
Chris during the concert about playing the National Anthem during the
2006 AFC football championship between the Denver Broncos and the
Pittsburgh Steelers. Due to the weather he was having
difficulty at the end because of the freezing temperatures but was able
to pull it off.
Chris
Botti and his band has been touring around the world playing
concerts. For this event he had special guest violinist
Caroline Campbell join him for several songs. Both Chris and
Caroline were amazing, and even stepped down from the stage and
performed in the audience.
Singer Sy Smith appeared towards the middle
of the concert and sang beautifully.
And opera singer George Komsky joined for a few
songs. George was a finalist on the reality show 'America's
Got Talent' and is currently touring with Chris'
band.
I think the highlight and most popular song of
the night that drew a standing ovation was when George, Caroline and
Chris performed their rendition of the Italian song Con Te
Partiro. This song has been famously performed by Italian
tenor Andrea Bocelli, and in my opinion Chris and his band did a nice
job and personal style to Con Te Partiro.
It was great listening to the live jazz
music, and I made a video with several of the song played by Chris Botti
and his band. Hope you enjoy the music! This was a
fun event and I can't wait to the open house on Thursday
evening. I'm looking forward to seeing new watches being
introduced at the event.
The 2nd annual Rodeo Drive Festival of Watches and Jewelry kicked-off on Sunday evening with a concert featuring Grammy Award winning trumpeter Chris Botti. The PuristSPro Team joined the festivities on the famed Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. The weather ...
Interesting to see Caroline Campbell pictured, as I am the former owner of one of Caroline Campbell's bows (but never met her during the sale process).
Thanks for checking out the report. This was the first time I heard Caroline Campbell play and she was fantastic. Very cool that you were the former owner of one of her bows. Was it autographed or something that you actually played with? Regards, ED-209