May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium

May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - Printable Version

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RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - 82lsju - 01-26-2026

there is apparently another ticket sale, to I'm not sure who, tomorrow at 10am PT. I was notified about in in an email from Stanford Live/Stanford Athletics. It appears this sale through gostanford and not ticketmaster (at east the link goes to gostanford and not ticketmaster)

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - 82lsju - 01-27-2026

(01-26-2026, 03:00 PM)82lsju Wrote: there is apparently another ticket sale, to I'm not sure who, tomorrow at 10am PT. I was notified about in in an email from Stanford Live/Stanford Athletics. It appears this sale through gostanford and not ticketmaster (at east the link goes to gostanford and not ticketmaster)

I was able to buy two tix in the sale that opened at 10am. They purchase comes with this disclaimer

Quote:Thank you for placing an order for the BTS WORLD TOUR 'ARIRANG' IN STANFORD.

Exact seat locations will be assigned closer to the event on a first-come first-served basis. If your full order cannot be accommodated in your selected seating category, you will be seated in the next best available seats and issued a refund for the difference. Mobile tickets will be delivered via Ticketmaster closer to the event.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - MV72018 - 01-27-2026

(01-25-2026, 09:51 PM)Jamesy Wrote:
(01-25-2026, 09:29 PM)KartyFan Wrote: And since cultural excellence is objective, by which objective criteria does BTS not meet the standard of cultural excellence?

Are there any musical artists that meet this standard who are actuve today?

Since MV didn't say anything about Coldplay performing last year, I assume they might meet this nebulous standard?

IMO, the "Village People" meet any plausible criteria for cultural mediocrity.

In all seriousness, I think that Stanford Lively Arts makes high-quality booking choices around 50% of the time. Batshit, Philharmonia Baroque, and Leif Ove Andsnes are superb choices. Booking the NY Phil and The Three Tenors to perform before tens of thousands in Central Park and Hyde Park decades ago was outstanding. Such could also be done in Stanford Stadium without turning it into a tumultuous mosh pit of screamers. Nietzsche once wrote: "For an event to be great, two things must be united -- the lofty sentiment of those who accomplish it, and the lofty sentiment of those who witness it." When large crowds came together in concert settings around the world in September 2021 ("Global Citizen Live") to fight hunger, famine, and Covid, including Coldplay and BTS, I thought that that audience qualified as culturally and humanly "great." I also submit that Leonard Bernstein leading the international orchestra he put together ad hoc to perform Beethoven's 9th at the Schauspeil Haus in East Berlin on Christmas Day, 1989, little more than a month after the Wall fell, was supreme cultural excellence.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - BobK - 01-27-2026

Too late to book Meatloaf and The Band my first choices.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - BostonCard - 01-27-2026

Apparently none other than the president of Mexico has made a personal appeal to her counterpart in Seoul for BTS to add a show to its Mexico City leg.
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/mexico-president-asks-korean-counterpart-more-bts-concerts-2026-01-26/

So apparently it is kind of a big deal.

BC

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - MV72018 - 01-28-2026

(01-27-2026, 10:29 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Apparently none other than the president of Mexico has made a personal appeal to her counterpart in Seoul for BTS to add a show to its Mexico City leg.
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/mexico-president-asks-korean-counterpart-more-bts-concerts-2026-01-26/

So apparently it is kind of a big deal.

BC

Does this request and/or the unmet demand that presumably underlies legitimize Stanford's willingness to let this pop group make brobdingnagian money by using the Stanford football stadium? I don't see it. It looks to me like an elected official is trying to endear herself with the Mexican electorate by making a grand public request to the head of another country. Shrewd of her but not probative of anything.

(01-27-2026, 02:01 PM)BobK Wrote: Too late to book Meatloaf and The Band my first choices.

Right, a Meatloaf "concert" in Stanford Stadium or Frost Amphitheater; only a little less outrageous than a Little Richard "concert" in Notre Dame Cathedral or on the Acropolis would be.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - BobK - 01-28-2026

I did attend Sly and the Family Stone at Frost

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - PalmTree - 01-28-2026

(01-28-2026, 12:26 AM)MV72018 Wrote:

(01-27-2026, 02:01 PM)BobK Wrote: Too late to book Meatloaf and The Band my first choices.

Right, a Meatloaf "concert" in Stanford Stadium or Frost Amphitheater; only a little less outrageous than a Little Richard "concert" in Notre Dame Cathedral or on the Acropolis would be.

Hell, Little Richard in Notre Dame? He would've SET.THE.PLACE.ON.FIRE! Oh - never mind - once was enough.

I can definitely see him playing the Acropolis though. It'd add to the list of other hallowed venues he graced - Louise Davies Symphony Hall (at least 3 concerts, including one on my bday in 2003), the JFK Center for the Performing Arts (at least 4 concerts), the Library of Congress - heck, even the Park Cemetery in Inglewood. Plus, he'd have fit right in with a pantheon of other cultural icons who've performed at the Acropolis - Foo Fighters, Jethro Tull, The Stranglers, Elton John, Septicflesh, Yanni....

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - cctop - 01-28-2026

MV72018, I'm still not clear on the point that you're arguing.

I think you're saying that Stanford should permit artists to perform on campus only if they meet some arbitrary standard of cultural excellence.

If that is a fair summary of your position, I would reply:
1) Morality may not be relative, but judgments of cultural relevance and excellence certainly are. I can pretty much guarantee that you would not consider Chinese opera excellent but one billion humans on this earth would disagree.
2) Who gets to decide (or gatekeep) what is culturally excellent? Even among the narrow demographic of old white guys on this board of which I am one, we will have major disagreements. You will never convince me that the works of Jackson Pollack and Mark Rothko are culturally excellent. It's one reason I like the music thread, as a way to combat the fact that most people's musical tastes ossify in their teens and early 20's.
3) Culturally excellent works are only apparent in the long view. What may seem excellent to people now may have no relevance 50 years from now. The examples you cite -- Beethoven and Wagner -- are from 200 to 300 years ago, and they wrote some stinkers in their time. Shakespeare wrote plays for the masses; it was only in the late 1700's that he really started to be elevated to the level he's at today. On a more recent time scale, just look at the list of Oscar winners for Best Picture from 20-30 years ago and see if you agree that they really were the best films of those years.
4) Symphonies, opera, ballet, other "high art" and fine art have rarely been financially viable. All have relied on patrons since the beginning. The SF Symphony plays live to the movie "Pirates of the Caribbean" to get the the funds to play Mahler the next week. I work in the film industry where this dynamic is well-known: you do one movie for the paycheck so that you can do your next movie for the art.

I would instead argue that when booking artists to perform, Stanford should and currently correctly does consider an artist's effect on society. Stanford should provide a platform for artists who uplift people and/or give us an opportunity to experience an aspect of our culture that we might not otherwise seek out. BTS would fall into that category in addition to making it financially viable for Stanford to host classical music and ballet performances on campus.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - BostonCard - 01-28-2026

Thank you cctop; you articulated exactly what I wanted to say much better than I could have written it.

BC

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - MV72018 - 01-28-2026

(01-28-2026, 11:25 AM)cctop Wrote: MV72018, I'm still not clear on the point that you're arguing.

I think you're saying that Stanford should permit artists to perform on campus only if they meet some arbitrary standard of cultural excellence.

If that is a fair summary of your position, I would reply:
1) Morality may not be relative, but judgments of cultural relevance and excellence certainly are. I can pretty much guarantee that you would not consider Chinese opera excellent but one billion humans on this earth would disagree.
2) Who gets to decide (or gatekeep) what is culturally excellent? Even among the narrow demographic of old white guys on this board of which I am one, we will have major disagreements. You will never convince me that the works of Jackson Pollack and Mark Rothko are culturally excellent. It's one reason I like the music thread, as a way to combat the fact that most people's musical tastes ossify in their teens and early 20's.
3) Culturally excellent works are only apparent in the long view. What may seem excellent to people now may have no relevance 50 years from now. The examples you cite -- Beethoven and Wagner -- are from 200 to 300 years ago, and they wrote some stinkers in their time. Shakespeare wrote plays for the masses; it was only in the late 1700's that he really started to be elevated to the level he's at today. On a more recent time scale, just look at the list of Oscar winners for Best Picture from 20-30 years ago and see if you agree that they really were the best films of those years.
4) Symphonies, opera, ballet, other "high art" and fine art have rarely been financially viable. All have relied on patrons since the beginning. The SF Symphony plays live to the movie "Pirates of the Caribbean" to get the the funds to play Mahler the next week. I work in the film industry where this dynamic is well-known: you do one movie for the paycheck so that you can do your next movie for the art.

I would instead argue that when booking artists to perform, Stanford should and currently correctly does consider an artist's effect on society. Stanford should provide a platform for artists who uplift people and/or give us an opportunity to experience an aspect of our culture that we might not otherwise seek out. BTS would fall into that category in addition to making it financially viable for Stanford to host classical music and ballet performances on campus.

Cctop, thank you for your thoughtful reply. There is much I'd like to say in response, but it would take an essay to do so carefully and with attention to nuance. To take but one example, you write "Morality may not be relative..." Having thought and researched such matters for decades, my view is that moral judgments often have a dual nature: there is something subjective about them AND something objective about them (having to do with our shared basic human needs which must be sufficed for our well-being). It's not an either/or. In fact, the very term "Morality" (like "Ethics") is used in four different senses, although they are rarely parsed. But I can't go into that here.

I'll limit myself to a couple of quick hitters re contentions you made:

1. Alas, you're wrong about my views re Chinese opera. While it's not my 'cup of tea,' you seem to think I'm a naive ethnocentric critic. I'm quite confident that the greatest of Chinese operas qualify as culturally excellent, and not just within the genre of Chinese opera.

2. I happen to agree with you that Rothko's and Pollack's works shouldn't be regarded as culturally excellent, even if they are widely judged excellent within the genre of 20th century non-representational art. If you had reflected on the three criteria for high excellence that I articulated earlier in this thread, you'd have seen that one of my criteria was that the work must shed some non-trivial light on an aspect of the perennial human condition. To me, that disqualifies Rothko's and Pollack's works, whereas it admits Picasso's "Guernica."....If most people's musical tastes ossify in their teens and 20s, that's their fault and their life loss. I used to play R&R guitar in high school and rejected all attempts to expose me to classical music and opera. Happily, when I came to Stanford as a grad student, I happened to hear Wagner's Tristan at Tressider one Sunday afternoon in the Music Listening Room and that induced me to audit Music 1 taught by Prof. William Crosten, which really opened my eyes.

3. Re your "Culturally excellent works are only apparent in the long view." I disagree with that generalization. To give several counterexamples, "The Rite of Spring," "The Death of a Salesman," "Ulysses," "The Trial," "Appalachian Spring," "West Side Story," "Rhapsody in Blue," etc.

4. Re your "Symphonies, opera, ballet, other "high art" and fine art have rarely been financially viable. All have relied on patrons since the beginning. The SF Symphony plays live to the movie "Pirates of the Caribbean" to get the the funds to play Mahler the next week. I work in the film industry where this dynamic is well-known: you do one movie for the paycheck so that you can do your next movie for the art."

(a) First of all, this "dynamic" is a relatively recent arrival. Various U.S. symphony orchestras only started prostituting themselves relatively recently. Face it, we in America do a lousy job supporting even our most excellent performing arts institutions. Contrast that with how its done in Germany, Italy, and Scandenavia, where cultural excellence is supported. Look at what is happening to the cultural scene in America these days: Trump Center, slash NEH, the SF Symphony having to do more and more film music, KDFC's "Classical California's Top 250" increasingly populated with mediocre film-music pieces allowed to stick its nose under the tent in order to attract more listeners. A grim scene, IMO. Whether the masterpieces of great music, opera, and literature will still be accessible in another 100 years, is increasingly doubtful, a sad development for those whose souls and intellects have been shaped by them.

(b) Finally, re your "I would instead argue that when booking artists to perform, Stanford should and currently correctly does consider an artist's effect on society. Stanford should provide a platform for artists who uplift people and/or give us an opportunity to experience an aspect of our culture that we might not otherwise seek out. BTS would fall into that category in addition to making it financially viable for Stanford to host classical music and ballet performances on campus." Just two points:

1. I'm not as sure as you seem to be that Stanford really does consider "an artist's effect on society." Sometimes it may. The Stanford Live management may take that into consideration, along with considerations of inclusiveness. If it does, great. 'Uplifting people' sounds good to me -- as long as that means more than sending them into convulsions of excitement and pandemonium and not turning into nauseating "uplifting" in the form that "Up With America" used to peddle.

2. As for 'giving us an opportunity to experience an aspect of our culture that we might not otherwise seek out,' that too sounds good to me. But, frankly and with respect, the astonishing Japanese taiko drummers who I remember used to perform on campus seem to me to offer that much more than BTS does or will. How much genuine Korean culture that would expand our horizons is there, really, in BTS's performances? Hopefully more than there was in Psy's "Gangnam Style" performances -- which I found energetic and infectious but didn't think were that genuinely Korean (Psy himself went to Berklee College of Music in Boston).

Anyway, thank you for joining the issues with me. Perhaps I'll see you at the once-in-a-lifetime exhibition of over 200 indisputable cultural masterpieces by Raffaello at the Metropolitan Museum in NYC starting in late March. MV72018.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - BrevinsBest - 05-16-2026

Tonight’s the first night of the BTS shows. I’ve heard merch lines are hours long. Over 100 trucks are on site for logistics and production. I’m going tomorrow night and am expecting pure pandemonium.
Looking forward to a great show even though I’m not a brobdingnagian K-pop fan.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - 82lsju - 05-16-2026

(05-16-2026, 03:20 PM)BrevinsBest Wrote: Tonight’s the first night of the BTS shows. I’ve heard merch lines are hours long. Over 100 trucks are on site for logistics and production. I’m going tomorrow night and am expecting pure pandemonium.
Looking forward to a great show even though I’m not a brobdingnagian K-pop fan.

we're going Tuesday, also not a major K-pop fan but looking forward to an interesting show. We got our tickets through the second offer that I received as a football season ticket buyer.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - johnbar - 05-16-2026

(05-16-2026, 03:30 PM)82lsju Wrote:
(05-16-2026, 03:20 PM)BrevinsBest Wrote: Tonight’s the first night of the BTS shows. I’ve heard merch lines are hours long. Over 100 trucks are on site for logistics and production. I’m going tomorrow night and am expecting pure pandemonium.
Looking forward to a great show even though I’m not a brobdingnagian K-pop fan.

we're going Tuesday, also not a major K-pop fan but looking forward to an interesting show. We got our tickets through the second offer that I received as a football season ticket buyer.

There was a merchandise pre-sale yesterday, with long lines. Made the channel 7 news, I believe.

I'm going tomorrow night; also not personally a big fan, but interested in the spectacle.

Hoping for intel on any glitches tonight so we can plan accordingly. (My wife is plugged into K-pop fan social media, so I expect she will hear all.)

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - cardcrimson - 05-16-2026

This may be answered above, but I missed it. How much is Stanford NIL getting from these gigs? Morgan Wallen played Bryant Denny, with the chunk of the proceeds going to the Alabama AD/NIL. Saban even walked out with Wallen, who's a h u g e Tennessee guy. First concert at the stadium in generations. . . .

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - Jamesy - 05-16-2026

(05-16-2026, 04:54 PM)cardcrimson Wrote: This may be answered above, but I missed it. How much is Stanford NIL getting from these gigs? Morgan Wallen played Bryant Denny, with the chunk of the proceeds going to the Alabama AD/NIL. Saban even walked out with Wallen, who's a h u g e Tennessee guy. First concert at the stadium in generations. . . .

I heard a rumor that Stanford is getting $5 million from these concerts.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - chrisk - 05-16-2026

(05-16-2026, 09:34 PM)Jamesy Wrote:
(05-16-2026, 04:54 PM)cardcrimson Wrote: This may be answered above, but I missed it. How much is Stanford NIL getting from these gigs? Morgan Wallen played Bryant Denny, with the chunk of the proceeds going to the Alabama AD/NIL. Saban even walked out with Wallen, who's a h u g e Tennessee guy. First concert at the stadium in generations. . . .

I heard a rumor that Stanford is getting $5 million from these concerts.

That amount seems reasonable given that the gross of tickets, parking, and concessions should approach or top $100M.

The temperature Saturday night dropped to 57 at end of the concert at 9:30pm. Sunday night at 9:30pm the temperature is predicted to be 10 degrees warmer.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - 82lsju - 05-17-2026

I found this part of a review amusing....

Quote:BTS delivered a really solid pop show, working through nearly two-dozen tracks on a mammoth 360-degree stage that covered more yardage on this football field than the Stanford offense.

https://www.mercurynews.com/2026/05/17/review-bts-concert-photos-tour-stanford-setlist/

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - Treebound - 05-17-2026

We were there last night and it was wonderful to see the stadium completely sold out and jumping! If only it had been for our football team! The show was enjoyable and I'm not a BTS or KPop fan. Lots of screaming girls and moms, which was good fun to witness. Props to Stanford Live, The Arts leadership and the AD for making this happen across three nights this year. I'm not sure what the AD netted from Cold Play - would love to know what others have heard?

$4-5m sounds within reason for three shows. We were in the press box and there were plenty of staff, faculty and VIPs on hand for the show. They were serving Korean food and Soju along with the normal faire. I think a good time was had by all and it was nice to see some of the BTS guys in Stanford gear including a baseball jersey. Would love to see something a little more main stream next year. My undergrad son and his friends had no interest in this show and they were all heading to Bay to Breakers this morning.

RE: May 16, 17, and 19 concerts at Stanford Stadium - Jamesy - 05-17-2026

(05-17-2026, 04:53 PM)Treebound Wrote: We were there last night and it was wonderful to see the stadium completely sold out and jumping! If only it had been for our football team! The show was enjoyable and I'm not a BTS or KPop fan. Lots of screaming girls and moms, which was good fun to witness. Props to Stanford Live, The Arts leadership and the AD for making this happen across three nights this year. I'm not sure what the AD netted from Cold Play - would love to know what others have heard?

$4-5m sounds within reason for three shows. We were in the press box and there were plenty of staff, faculty and VIPs on hand for the show. They were serving Korean food and Soju along with the normal faire. I think a good time was had by all and it was nice to see some of the BTS guys in Stanford gear including a baseball jersey. Would love to see something a little more main stream next year. My undergrad son and his friends had no interest in this show and they were all heading to Bay to Breakers this morning.

How are they not mainstream if they packed the stadium and had hours long waits for merchandise?