Confessions Tour - Concert Synopsis

Concert Synopsis

The concert was divided into four parts: Equestrian, Bedouin, Glam-Punk and Disco. The Equestrian segment of the show began with images of Madonna, riding crop in hand, and horses cantering across windswept plains on the big screens. A giant disco ball was then lowered onstage, and opened like a flower bud to reveal Madonna inside. As she took her dancers' reins, she performed "Future Lovers/I Feel Love". This was followed by "Get Together" backed by her dancers in horse reins. She rode a carousel horse-like dancepole during "Like a Virgin". The backdrops displayed the X-Ray of Madonna's broken bones, which she had during a previous accident. "Jump" followed this performance, where the dancers displayed the physical discipline parkour. After Madonna disappeared backstage, three of her dancers then revealed personal tragedies during an interlude called "Confessions". The second segment titled Bedouin started with Madonna appearing on a mirrored crucifix to sing "Live to Tell" as a death toll of African AIDS victims counted down onscreen above her. She stepped down off the cross to perform "Forbidden Love" where two male dancers intertwined each other while displaying religious symbolism on the screens like blood corpuscles connecting to form symbols of hope and unity. Madonna brought a guest vocalist from her Confessions on a Dance Floor album onstage for "Isaac", when a female dancer in an oversized Middle-Eastern burka danced within a cage with the backdrops displaying sand dunes. Madonna then recreated the dance-off scene from her "Sorry" music video live with her troupe for her performance of the song. The performance was followed by the song "Like It Or Not" where burlesque-style dancing was performed by Madonna with the help of a chair as a prop. After the performance, her dancers performed krump dancing for a remix interlude of "Sorry" as social, political, and ecological images flashed onscreens.

Madonna returned for the Glam-Punk segment of the show and strapped on a guitar for rocked-out versions of "I Love New York" and "Ray of Light". The backdrop during the performances displayed the New York skyline sliding off and stars respectively. "Ray of Light" was accompanied by her dancers in New Wave style dance, while wearing black clothes and white ties. An energetic rendition of "Let It Will Be" followed before she sat down for some minutes to talk with her audience. She later started singing "Drowned World/Substitute for Love" without any choreography or backdrop video, only sitting on the floor, and then recalled co-singer Yitzhak Sinwani out for an acoustic version of "Paradise (Not for Me)". The final segment Disco started after a brief radio-style mini-mix of old hits. Madonna emerged in a butterfly-collared suit influenced by John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever for a mash-up of "Music" and The Trammps' 1976 single "Disco Inferno" This also included a sample of her 1986 song "Where's The Party" at the beginning of the song while dancers rollerskated circles around her. Stuart Price's remixed dance version of "Erotica", which sampled the song's original demo "You Thrill Me", is performed. The next song was a Tropical-Dance version of "La Isla Bonita", where the screens displayed clips of different beautiful islands, the sea and its fauna. This is followed by "Lucky Star"; this dance re-invention of the song shared the same musical arrangement than the following and final song of the evening "Hung Up", which is accompanied by a sing-along with the audience and confetti and golden balloons falling from above. The show ended as the phrase "Have you confessed?" appeared onscreen.

A demo of a Stuart Price remix of "Everybody" has surfaced which incorporates elements of "Where's the Party". "Everybody" would likely have followed "Erotica" (the beginning of "Everybody" can be heard at the end of an exclusive student version of "Erotica" that was made available to members of Madonna's fanclub through madonna.com).