I don`t do facebook . It didn`t even take a trained eye to see. They`ve done big shows,....Why?
The reason is the same why much of the awards show you see are canned; there is far too much that can go wrong in a very short period of time with a great deal on the line. In the case of this event, physically building the production (which was much reduced this year) in the time frame allotted is a herculean task. How many desks and engineers would it take to confirm the audio lines in the time allotted prior to the downbeat? Quite a lot. Imagine the blowback if a bass didn't work or a drum mult was cross threaded during the changeover and all of sudden you have no drum mics? Vocals are usually live as are some solos, but that is about it. People have invested millions in this show and there are millions of people watching. As I said, the stakes are extremely high. This is nothing like barnstorming the local club and figuring out the mix in the first two tunes.
I thought Bruno was great. It is no small feat to relate to an audience of that size successfully. Madonna failed, the Black Eyed Peas failed miserably, The Who were OK. For him to stand there and deliver that ballad on a 6' diameter stage in the middle of a football field was very impressive. There really are not a lot of top tier performers that can actually do that.
Bill, I love marching bands and drum corps as much as anyone and I hate that we never get to see that anymore in college broadcasts. To me that was always part of the pageantry that is college football. Marching bands and various stars were the norm for the Super Bowl up until the late 80's / early 90's. At this point the Super Bowl half time show is the reason for a decent percentage of the viewing audience, basically catering to folks that might not otherwise be interested in the game. Coming from a live event production background, I also enjoy them. Well, actually, I enjoy the idea of them, but there have certainly been some serious duds. Did I already mention the Black Eyed Peas?