But of course the longer we live the less chance we will have of seeing the original artists as they sadly die off.
And then all we are left with is the tribute bands. Most of them are excellent, often much better than the original, but they aren't the originals.
Many years ago we saw Art Garfunkel at Norwich Theatre Royal. It was the actual Art Garfunkel. It was a very good concert. As we were going out somebody said "it's a shame Paul Simon wasn't with him."
Another replied: "If Paul Simon was with Garfunkel they wouldn't be playing Norwich Theatre Royal." Fair comment.
For some reason I'm happy with Beatles tribute bands and enjoyed one New Year's Eve down the Cavern Club in Liverpool with the Cavern Beatles whose reproduction of the Fab Four sound was spot on as you would imagine.
We came away from that concert to the sound of what we assumed were fireworks - it was the early hours of New Year's Day after all. But I thought it strange that there was no aerial display. We learnt that the noise was cars in a car park exploding. One car had caught fire and a domino effect saw virtually every car in the car park destroyed. Many people were stranded in Liverpool that night and the car park had to be demolished and totally rebuilt.
But back to my piece about tribute bands.
For Christmas we were given a voucher for Gorleston Pavilion. We had been shown round the building as part of the annual heritage events in Norfolk. It was a fascinating place and we made a note to attend something there and then came the voucher from a friend who had obviously made a note of our intentions.
So we perused the programme once and perused the programme twice and perused the programme thrice and it just appeared to be tribute bands with the odd pantomime and summer show thrown in. I use the word odd to mean occasional rather than bizarre, although they may well have been that as well.
So the least annoying of the tribute bands seemed to be something entitled "The Carpenters' Experience." Once I had explained to the other threequarters that the evening didn't involve nails and pieces of wood, I booked two tickets.
So at this point I will digress to tell you a little about that day. Originally we had planned to spend the day in Gorleston but we realised that might be too much as the concert wasn't until 8 pm.
So we decided to go mid to late afternoon as the other threequarters had a singing fellowship practice early afternoon.
So that gave us an entire morning free for gardening. I have a love/hate relationship with gardening. Sometimes I love doing the garden and sometimes I'm just not in the mood. This day I quite enjoyed it and so made good progress. Then I did a few hours' work on my e magazine before we set off for Gorleston.
It was a pretty slow journey with heavy traffic but we eventually arrived. Gorleston has two great points. Point one is one of the largest and best sandy beaches you will come across anywhere and point two is there is loads of free roadside parking.
If you've seen the film Yesterday, Gorleston beach was featured in the concert towards the end of the film which was shot from the roof of the Pier Hotel with hundreds of film extras on the expansive beach.
We had a lengthy walk along the prom prom tiddely on pom pom and then went to a Tapas restaurant called The Shed. It is rated number one in the area and I had booked a table. The Tapas was good and the dishes were much larger than usual and by the time we finished we were right royally stuffed.
We always enjoy Tapas as it gives the chance to try lots of different dishes.
Anyway we got to Gorleston Pavilion a good half an hour before the start of the "Carpenters' Experience." Seating in the pavilion is rather strange. You watch the show from small tables with six chairs at each table, two at the front, two at the back and one on each side. If you want to buy a drink during the performance you wave a flag and a waiter magically appears. It all adds to the fun of the evening. If you have the front seats it's a bit difficult as you can't face the table because you would have your back to the stage and so your drinks are behind you. Luckily we had the forward facing seats, not that it mattered as, after our blow out at the shed, we needed neither food nor drink.
We had nobody on our side chairs but we had two ladies on the front facing.
During the interval the other threequarters turned to me and said.
"Do you know what the football score is?" To which one of the ladies turned round.
" Five past nine", she said before turning back. Added something of a surreal value to the evening.
Now I must discuss the Carpenters. If I was listing my favourite 10 female vocalists of all time, Karen Carpenter would be right up there along with the likes of Joan Baez, Judy Collins and Sandy Denny and a few more.
I love Karen Carpenter's silky voice and I have loved the Carpenters' music since I first heard "Close To You". I'm trying to remember whether that would have been on Pirate Radio and have a feeling it may have been on Radio Caroline.
Now I love heavy rock, I love classical, I love some weird and wonderful stuff but I'm also a succer for schmaltz and the Carpenters fitted that bill.
But Karen and Richard's story is a very sad one. Karen suffered body image problems and died in her early 30s from a heart attack brought on by an eating disorder. The world lost one of its great voices. Karen Carpenter never seemed to accept that she had a unique voice.
Richard her brother became addicted to prescription drugs. I think he always felt undervalued with his sister getting the limelight that she probably never wanted and couldn't cope with. Richard was not only an excellent pianist but was an arranger and also wrote some of the Carpenters' best material. He was also the brains behind the duo but it was always Karen who got the plaudits. I guess he felt under valued. He's still around, now in his late seventies.
If you listen to some of their later songs, the lyrics are sad and act as something of a confessional for Karen after the breakdown of her marriage and amidst her battles with ill health. It's a tragic story.
So we enjoyed the Carpenters' Experience although I have to say that it wasn't so much an experience as a cabaret of a band playing Carpenters music. There wasn't a story to it and what we got was all the hits and not much about the duo apart from a few video clips on screens that seemed to be just a small nod to their lives.
The vocalist did a good job but didn't sound greatly like Karen Carpenter. And that really sums up my dislike of tribute bands. Years ago I went to Norwich Waterfront to see a David Bowie tribute which actually featured Woody Woodmancy who was the drummer in Bowie's backing band The Spiders From Mars. They had a guest singer whose name escapes me but he was a member of the band Gene Loves Jezebel. He sounded nothing like Bowie and spent most of the evening between songs talking about himself
But enough about tribute bands. The audience loved the concert and have left some glowing reviews on Facebook and the band seemed genuinely to appreciate the response and engaged brilliantly with the audience. They even got us all to stand up so they could take a photo which they posted on their Facebook page.
Before I leave this I must point out that quite a few Carpenters' songs were written by two of my favourite songwriters - Leon Russell and Paul Williams. Williams in particular has written many classic songs but most people won't have heard of him. He wrote the songs for the musical Bugsy Malone amongst many others. To my mind his song "We've Only Just Begun" is one of the most romantic pieces ever written.
I've enjoyed writing this blog as it's just about a day of ordinary events that triggered off memories. I must do that more often. What do you think?
*. *. *
Occasionally a football match transcends sport and becomes a drama. Such was the play off League One semi final second leg between Sheffield Wednesday and Peterborough a few days ago.
Peterborough had a massive 4-0 lead from the first leg but somehow Sheffield whittled away at that lead and made it 4-4 with virtually the last kick of normal time. Peterborough took the lead in extra time only for Sheffield to equalise yet again and then win the tie on penalty kicks. It was pure drama.
Sorry to those who don't like music or football but today's blog has been about both.