Once In a Lifetime

How great was the music in the 70’s? I was a teenager in the 70’s, and still love to sing along to those old tunes – great songs, fun songs, great lyrics, songs you could really sing along to (and dance along to).

Teenage girls in the 70’s either loved David Cassidy or Donny and the Osmond brothers. I was the David Cassidy fan, whilst my sister, Toni, preferred Donny.

Well, you can imagine our excitement when we heard that the ‘Once In A Lifetime’ show was touring the UK and coming to Sheffield Arena on Saturday 22nd April 2007! David Cassidy, the Osmonds (sadly minus Donny), David Essex and Showaddywaddy. Toni and I booked our tickets in January and have been looking forward to it ever since.

So yesterday, we drove the 1½ hours to Sheffield in plenty of time to be able to watch the other 10,000 people pour into the huge venue ready for what promised to be a fun evening. Before we had even found our seat, we had great fun watching the amazing shapes, outfits and characters of all the other women (yes, you guessed it, the audience was mostly women of a certain age). If only I’d taken my camera, but just imagine a wild hen night for 8,000 women and 2,000 onlookers.

We managed to find our seats in the top row(!) of the side block and despite our initial disappointment thinking we would not be able to see much, we realised that we could see just fine and also we would be able to dance and stand and sing and do anything we wanted without disturbing anyone behind us!! We quickly got chatting to the ‘girls’ next to us who were just as excited (unlike the reluctant husbands they had dragged along – why??). We were taking bets on the order of the line up. Toni and I reckoned that David Cassidy was the main man, so it would be: Showaddywaddy, David Essex, the Osmonds and David Cassidy for the finale. The other girls agreed. The reluctant husband thought that David Essex would be the most popular and therefore last! Ha!!


The opening band was Showaddywaddy who were great for getting everyone singing, dancing and clapping. You forget quite how many hits they had, and how easily the words come back into your head, and it was a great start to the evening! Next was, surprisingly, David Cassidy. Aaah, lovely David Cassidy. He is a great singer. I have his ‘Then and Now’ CD, so was able to sing along loudly to his songs. It was the last night of the tour and he was back to USA the next day and so he was a little emotional about how great us Brits are and how it’s like his second home here (very gushy, like only an American can!). It was great.

Then a bit of a break for a quick half a shandy and a queue for the loos - the queue was as long as a seriously long queue in Q town.

David Essex was next (so, we were all wrong on the order of the line-up!). He was also really great and REALLY popular. Lots more songs to sing and clap along to. By this time we were starting to feel a little horse and our hands were stinging from all the clapping! Last, but by no means least, was the Osmonds. True professionals, great singing. They also did a great medly of 70s songs by others which was fun. By 11pm it was all over and time to go home. We’d had a fantastic evening. Well worth £40. The bands have threatened to be back next year – can we book our tickets now...? (will that be the ‘Twice In A Lifetime Tour’??)