We met Tom Klose in a café, dressed in a light blue sweater with a black
countryside hat, relaxed and very smiley. Do you know that feeling when you
talk to someone and time just passes by? We had one like that with Tom.
He talked to us about his adventures and the wonderful experiences he got to
live when he traveled Europe. From the Netherlands, on to Belgium, France,
Spain and then finally Portugal, he played SofaConcerts along the way. Crossing
North to South, he only needed his guitar, a backpack and the support of our
awesome hosts.
What motivates artists to play a concert
for a smaller audience?
“It’s a really nice thing to do, it’s really special, I don’t want to
miss it. It’s the other side of music. I like to play live all the time and
that is for me an outlet when I want to play for people. I think, it’s also
because all of my role models did it. I always think of Matt Corby, because he
did house concert tours in backyards, he is so good! He is so good in the
extend of thinking what is he doing in someone’s backyard, but he is like ‘I
don’t care about it, I just love to play for people in this kind of setting’
and I totally understand that. You are just closer to the people.”
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| Taken by Hauke (Portugal) |
So, how did it all begin?
Well, Hauke from Portugal got a request from Tom for his European
tour and it was Hauke’s first sofa concert. One of his friends already hosted
Tom Klose before and advised Hauke to book him.
“It was my first event with SofaConcerts and it was a great experience.
I had absolutely no doubts hosting a sofa concert, we went for the concert to
one of the most beautiful miradors of Lisbon because my "small
problem" is that my cozy house hasn`t really a living room, I just came up
with the idea to declare my amazing Lisbon to my "living room”. Having Tom
play a concert in front of this amazing setting, was almost like a guarantee of
a good evening for me.”
Manon & Sebastien heard about SofaConcerts from Joel Havea
and have been hosting concerts in their beautiful house near Toulouse ever
since. She listened to Tom Klose thinking he suited perfectly to the
SofaConcerts aspect.
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| Le salon des artistes (Manon & Sebastien, France) |
How would you define your SofaConcert’s
experience?
Manon: “100% of success! In general, the guests are prudent, at best
curious when we invite them, however each time at the end, they are happy and
impressed by the artist, acknowledging the private moment that they just lived
and they ask for more. It’s a concept that should be known better.”
Which were your doubts before registering
as a host?
“The artist pending: I was scared that I wouldn’t find enough guests,
that there wouldn’t be enough participation and that it would be too expensive
for the artist. Finally, the artist gave me comfort toward that (and the guests
were generous).”
What would you say to hosts who hesitate or
have just registered?
“Try the experience at least once, you will be convinced. It’s an
incredible opportunity to discover people, to share music and above all to live
the emotion conveyed by the artist at the most.”
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| Taken by Manon & Sebastien (France) |
Could you give us a little anecdote from Tom Klose’s gig?
“The fact that he did some effort to present his songs with some French
words, as well as when he played a bit of piano which people liked.What wowed
us is his voice… When the first notes came out, we all got shivers and got
stuck right in, till the end of the song"
To whom would you recommend SofaConcerts?
“To everybody who likes music and likes to share it, without worrying
about the size of your place because some artists don’t have any audience
requirements, they just want to share their passion.
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| Taken by Hauke (Portugal) |
So, back to Tom! We asked him how it is to play for hosts that don’t speak the same language:
“I tried to speak french very hard, there are some people that didn’t
speak english very well so I thought it would be funny. Every one is the same
actually, it was in the back of my mind, but you have to live it to find out.
They are into the same kind of bands and they live the same kind of way, they
just live somewhere else. So that is really cool. Manon and Sebastien are the
ideal living room concerts hosts, really. Everything was set up perfectly. Same
with Hauke, he is the best. The setting was really nice, the overview over the
town with the sunset going down...”
One more thing…
Tom played over a hundred house concerts and he’s planning to do a
SofaConcerts tour in Germany in January. So far, the tour counts 19 concerts.
At the very beginning of SofaConcerts, he was already excited about the idea of
doing a host concert tour and was waiting for the platform to grow bigger which
it did to this point. If you are interested to host him, check out his profile!
You liked this article? Tell us which artist’s experiences you want to
know about and we will do our best to write an article about it! If you are a
host and you want to share your experience, you can too contact us at
support@sofaconcerts.org ! We are more than happy to write about our community!
