Shania Twain reigns in Tulsa stop
TULSA — The “Queen of Country Pop” blasted into Oklahoma ready to impress Saturday night.
Shania Twain proved she could still rule a stage, putting on a show to “shimmy, shake, make the earth quake,” to the delight of her sold-out audience at Tulsa’s BOK Center.
In the 30th year of her genre-defying career, the best-selling female artist in country music history is on the road with her “Queen of Me Tour,” supporting her newly released sixth studio album of the same name.
It’s the first tour and album for Twain, 57, since she underwent open-throat surgery in 2018. Although her voice admittedly isn’t what it once was, the five-time Grammy Award winner still knows how to show her fervent fans a “teasing, squeezing, pleasing kind of time.”
Here are five highlights from Twain’s Tulsa stop on her “Queen of Me Tour”:
1. Twain masters the art of misdirection
With the “Queen of Me Tour,” the icon is opening her concerts with a master class in the magical art of misdirection: The Tulsa crowd thundered as the arena suddenly went dark and theatrical fog rolled. Twain’s talented band took the stage — but she didn’t.
Wearing sparkly cat-eye sunglasses and a chic black coat, Twain instead emerged in the midst of the floor seats and made her way to stage while singing her perky “Waking Up Dreaming.” Her new electropop hit’s lyrics about “making our way to Mars” set the stage for her anthemic “Up!” to be accompanied by a neon-hued rocket launch on a large LED screen.
With the word “Oklahoma” all but jumping off the high-definition video screen in big candy-colored letters, the Canadian Music Hall of Famer launched into the sassy and a little bluegrassy “Don’t Be Stupid (You Know I Love You),” a personal favorite from the 1990s. As she strutted in a bright yellow miniskirt with matching cape, a black midriff-bearing top with silver sparkles and fishnet stockings with short glittering black boots, this Gen Xer instantly flashed back to those days when Twain emerged as a pop culture phenomenon.
After the final chorus, Twain suddenly disappeared below the stage, leaving her pair of first-rate
backup singer/dancers to engage the audience with an entertaining tap dance-off.
The guys kept the crowd distracted long enough for Twain to make a dramatic reappearance perched on a silvery motorcycle shaped like a horse. She got us — and then lounged on the faux chopper to croon “I’m Gonna Getcha Good!”
2. Icon improvises a love song to her fans with opening act Breland
Although she is a living legend in the third decade of her career, the native of Timmins, Ontario, still possesses a small-town, down-to-earth air and seemed to genuinely relish her Tulsa crowd’s unabashed adoration.
Twain often flashed her familiar wide smile, threw out her arms triumphantly and even screamed with joy in between hits.
But the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Famer went above and beyond the usual fan service Saturday night when one enthusiastic concertgoer screamed out, “I love you, Shania!”
She not only responded with the usual, “I love you, too,” but she also spent several minutes improvising a heartfelt ballad about how much she loved Oklahoma.
“I promise you, that’s a song,” Twain said after singing a few lines. “I’ll write it, I’ll finish it, and then it will be our song.”
She even invited her opening act, “Cross Country” up-and-comer Breland, to return to the stage to serenade the audience with her.
It wasn’t the only time Twain paid tribute to her loyal devotees during the concert: She threw in a medley of fan favorites like “She’s Not Just a Pretty Face,” “Waiter! Bring Me Water!” and “When” that she hasn’t regularly performed in concert before this tour. She brought a nightclub intimacy to the arena by inviting six pairs of concertgoers to stand at little tables on stage while she crooned her ardent chart-topper “From This Moment On.”
3. ‘Queen of Me’ balances familiar favorites and new anthems
As with her 2015 “Rock This Country Tour” stop in OKC, Shania’s “Queen of Me Tour” show in Tulsa cannily balanced songs from across her long and storied career.
The crowd thrilled as she zipped through her high-energy vintage hits like “Any Man of Mine,” “Honey, I’m Home” “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under.”
Her raucous 2000 anthem “Rock This Country!” was accompanied by dazzling video fireworks, and she performed 2017’s sultry come-on “Roll Me on the River,” against a backdrop of LED fire and stage smoke. The simulated flames burned into a conflagration on her fiery new kiss-off “Pretty Liar.”
Most of the Tulsa crowd happily went along for the ride on her fast-paced new ditty “Giddy Up!,” her new dancepop ballad “Number One” matched the oversized disco balls embedded in the stage, and her latest album’s hip-shaking title track, which closed her main set, fits in with the tuneful empowerment anthems that have defined her career.
4. Superstar refuses to let vocal shortcomings keep her down
With all her well-documented struggles with her voice, it’s a testament to Twain’s hard work and determination that she’s continuing to sing, record and tour at all. After she contracted Lyme disease from a 2003 tick bite, the lingering illness damaged nerves in her vocal cords, leading to her having open-throat surgery in 2018.
The first recording artist in history to release three consecutive diamond-certified albums, Twain more recently survived a near-fatal bout with COVID-19 and pneumonia.
Her voice isn’t as strong or supple as it used to be, and it sometimes seemed to fade or get raspy, especially on her older ballads like “From This Moment On” and “Forever and for Always.”
Fortunately, Twain’s sassy confidence and sex appeal have not been diminished, and she has adopted coping strategies.
She surrounds herself with great backup performers, pauses to share stories between songs and, especially, urges her eager fans to do just what they would do anyway: happily wail along with her.
5. Shania Twain dons signature leopard-print outfit for finale
Never let it be said that Shania doesn’t understand the impact of a dramatic entrance or a grand finale. Vanishing after “Queen of Me,” she left the crowd clamoring for an encore.
With a sudden burst of light, she reappeared suddenly at the top of the stage to belt her smash “That Don’t Impress Me Much” in a familiar leopardprint outfit.
“This is the original wardrobe from the ‘That Don’t Impress Me Much’ video,” she confirmed.
The crowd was screaming for her hit “Man! I Feel Like a Woman!” before she could even drawl “Let’s go, girls.”
Like the rest of her show, the big finish showcased what made Shania a queen in the first place: Her knack for reminding people of their “prerogative to have a little fun” — and “doing it in style.”