-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AUTO SHOW CHARITY GALA
On January 10, 2003 Celine Dion performed for Chrysler Company at the "North American International Auto Show", which took place at Cobo Center in Detroit, USA. Chrysler Group President and CEO Dieter Zetsche mounted the stage to introduce his new star. Celine, wearing a black lace top with black pants, opened the mini concert with "I drove all night", the new single and the centerpiece of her Chrysler advertising campaign that debuts January 19, 2003 during the Golden Globe Awards. The song made its debut on January 21, 2003 in radio stations. As she sang, Chrysler´s advertising theme, "Drive & Love", was projected on a screen behind her. Between songs she praised the gala, the crowd and Chrysler, saying that their relationship "is a love story that started a long time ago" when she was a spokeswoman for Chrysler Canada. Then, Celine performed "Have you ever been in love" and finally the Oscar-winning hit "My heart will go on". The event was a success. Thousands of guests (17,500) waited two hours for Celine, Chrysler AG´s newest spokeswoman, to sing three songs. The Detroit-area broadcast of the preview was great for WXYZ´s ratings. It was the highest-rated program from 7:30-9:30 p.m., and Celine´s 15 minutes scored a 12.9 rating, three points better than WXYZ´s usual programming. "She was fabulous. Absolutely terrific. This takes the auto show to a whole new level", said Marcie Hill, one of 17,500 people who paid $350 each to attend the children´s charities benefit.
CONCERT IN LAS VEGAS
On March 25, 2003 Celine Dion performed at the Colosseum of the Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, USA. This was the first performance of the highly successful show "A New Day...", created and directed by Franco Dragone. This first concert was broadcasted as a TV special on CBS channel with the name "A New Day... Opening Night Live", and it was hosted by Justin Timberlake. Timberlake talked with Celine just before the concert. During the show Celine performed "Nature boy", "The power of love", "It´s all coming back to me now", "Because you loved me", "To love you more", "I´m alive", "I drove all night", "Seduces me", "I surrender", "Ammore annascunnuto", "Love can move mountains", "The first time ever I saw your face", "Have you ever been in love" and others. Although just few songs were broadcasted on the TV special. Celine also performed several covers as "Fever" (by Elvis Presley), "I´ve got the world on a string" (by Frank Sinatra), "If I could" (by Barbra Streisand), "I wish" (by Stevie Wonder) and "What a wonderful world" (by Louis Armstrong). This first perfomance of "A New Day..." was a highly successful show.
CONCERT IN LAS VEGAS
On March 26, 2003 Celine Dion performed at the Colosseum of the Caesars Palace in Las vegas, USA with the highly successful show "A New Day...". This was the second perfomance of this show created by Franco dragone. The audience was even nicer than the night before (the 25th there were may VIP´s in the audience as David Foster, Luc Plamandon, Rick Wake, Ricky Lake, David Hasselhoff, Tim Allen, Barry Manilow, Lance Bass, Paul Anka, Garou, Josh Groban and many other celebrities). Celine opened the show at a staircase, on top of the videowall. She walked down, step by step and then, suddenly, she was on stage performing "Nature boy". After this first song it was really dark in the theatre and then Celine appeared with other clothes on, the red suit, and she performed "The power of love". After this song she got a big standing ovation and she continued perfoming "It´s all coming back to me now" (with beautiful footage at the videowall, it looked a bit like a castle and there were thunderstorms too), "Because you loved me" and "To love you more" with a violinist. She sang "Have you ever been in love" and "I´m alive", with very bright and happy images at the videowall and the dancers giving their best. And "Seduces me", when she did this song she sat down in a chair, with the male dancers dancing around her, pushing each other away because they all wanted to be with her. Celine also performed "If I could" dedicated to her son Rene Charles (they projected a tree at the videowall and there was a tree blossoming at the stage, there were people at swings), "Ammore annascunuto" (they create a kind of atmosphere that fits the song very well), "Love can move mountains" (she got the whole theatre dancing), "I surrender", "The first time ever I saw your face" (flying from one side of the theatre to the other side, and one of the dancers tries to give her a rose), "I drove all night" and many covers as "At last", "I´ve got the world on a string", "Fever" and "I wish". In "My heart will go on" was projected a beautiful background again, there was a full moon at the videoscreen that moved to the right, becoming smaller and smaller. The last song she did, was "What a wonderful world". She introduced this song with a talk to the audience. At the end of the song Celine said goodbye and all the dancers and her band lined up on stage.
CONCERT IN LAS VEGAS
On April 17, 2003 Celine Dion performed at the Colosseum of the Caesars Palace in Las vegas, USA with the highly successful show "A New Day...". On that day, there was an extremely long line of people who were trying to get tickets for a show already soldout. The line was at least 200 people long about 30 minutes before showtime. The massive video screen is definitely the next big star of the show. Not just how real they look but because the screen is almost the entire size of the stage back wall, when an image is displayed on it, the audience really feel the stage is continuous with the displayed image. The audience was in for a real stellar journey when Celine performed "My heart will go on". Another plus, there was no half-time show break. It was a continuous show and Celine was featured prominently in every scene except for when she was briefly offstage for a costume change or working her way back to the stage from the ceiling. At those brief moments the audience was treated to a visual feast put on by the dancers. At the end of the show, Celine gave a rose to a white-heaired woman sitting up front. Celine told the woman that she reminded her of her mother. Celine said that her parents were in Vegas for two months and had just returned home. Celine became emotional in the process and forget her next line to introduce the lovely italian song she did. She could not recall that the name of the city where the song originated is, Naples. While it was a bit funny it was also touching because she was truly overcome with emotion when she saw the woman. Celine gave another 8 shows that month.
VH1 DIVAS DUETS CONCERT
On May 22, 2003, Celine Dion performed at the benefit "VH1: Divas Duets Concert", which took place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, USA. The concert was hosted by Queen Latifah and it was broadcasted and organized by VH1 channel. Celine performed "Have you ever been in love" wearing a sexy pink dress. She was introduced by Queen Latifah. The show sequence was: Queen Latifah sang "When you´re good to Latifah", Beyoncé and Jewel sang "Proud Mary", then Celine performed her song and Chaka Khan sang a medley with the songs "I feel for you" and "I´m every woman". Mary J. Blige sang another medley with "Real love", "Love no limit" and "Family affair". Then, The Isley Brothers with Ashanti sang "Who´s that lady?", Beyoncé sang "Dangerously in love", Lisa Marie Presley dang "Lights out" and in duet with Pat Benatar they performed "Heartbreaker". Ashanti sang "Rock wit you", Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown sang a medley with "Something in common" and "My love", Jewel sang "Intuition", Chaka Khan and Mary J. Blige sang "Sweet thing", Tarralyn Ramsey snag "I wanna dance with somebody", Whitney Houston sang "On my own", Stevie Wonder did a tribute medley singing with Shania Twain, Whitney Houston, Beyoncé, Jewel, Mary J. Blige, Ashanti, Chaka Khan and Qeen Latifah. For the finale, Stevie Wonder, Whitney Houston, Mary J. Blige, Beyoncé, Chaka Khan, Jewel, Ashanti and Queen Latifah performed "Higher ground". After Celine´s perfomance, she was interviewed by Sharon Osbourne. At the end, Celine signed an autograph on a T-shirt which was auctioned. After the concert, Celine was photographed.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
