Donnerstag, 27. Oktober 2016

Five questions you always had about being a host.



  
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.”


Taken by Hauke (Portugal)
We were really curious to jump on the other side of the story. If Tom found his motivation through house concerts, what about the hosts? What do they think about hosting an artist? How were their experiences and above all, what did they want to share with you?


                    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.

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.”

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.



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!