Linda Ronstadt Wows Fans in Saratoga Concert
by Mike Kane, The Post-Star, August 16, 1977
Backed by a versatile five-man band, Linda Ronstadt proved to 10,789 people at Saratoga Performing Arts Center Sunday that she is the top female singer in rock music today.
Ronstadt performed 20 tunes for the orderly crowd with no pauses, interruptions, and only one missed lyric.
Clad in a sporty bare-shouldered dress and with a red flower in her hair, she moved through the one- hour-and-20-minute set without trouble, although, despite more than 10 years of performing, she appeared shy and self-conscious on stage.
Beginning with “Ball And Chain” and moving through such Ronstadt hits as “That’ll Be The Day,” “When Will I Be Loved,” “Desperado” and “Love Is A Rose,” she finished off the show with “You’re No Good.”
The crowd brought her back for one ballad. At the conclusion of the encore, Ronstadt and keyboardist Don Grolnick made a quick dash to join the rest of the band members in a waiting customized bus which whisked them quickly away from the Performing Arts Center.
She left the crowd happy. They had just seen a beautiful, petite, wisp-of-a-girl belt out a group of ballads and rockers with a voice that can be at one moment soft, sexy, innocent, vulnerable and at the next moment strong, gutsy and rowdy. The little girl was transformed into a woman.
Four years after she played as a warm-up act for a James Taylor show, Linda Ronstadt returned to Saratoga Performing Arts Center as the top-billed act. And she showed why she made it.
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