Superstar diva’s voice still surprisingly strong.

Mariah Carey made her performance debut in Ottawa last night in front of a smallish crowd of 2,900 at Scotiabank Place. Although she arrived on stage late, seemed to rush through songs and took breaks to conserve her energy, these were not simply attention-getting techniques from the famously difficult diva.

No, the superstar had a little cold, she informed us early in the evening, picked up from one of her dancers. It cut into her sleep, she added, “but here I am. The show must go on.”

In a gold-and-sequined princess dress that showed off her ample cleavage, Carey made a fashionably late entrance dangling in a cocoon-like bundle that descended from the ceiling to the stage.

The full-length gown was torn away, revealing a short, leg-baring skirt as her breathy soprano fluttered into Butterfly, then darted from Shake It Off, Touch My Body and Fly Like a Bird.

Her voice was surprisingly strong, despite the sniffles, but there were backup singers and electronic effects enhancing her natural vocal power. A full band and a contingent of dancers accompanied Carey on stage, and she occasionally let them take over while she rested her voice and changed outfits.

“I’m not going to complain because I love everybody,” Carey said, as if to remind herself not to complain. “No matter what you do, you can’t make me hate you.”

At one point, Carey played up her diva reputation with a tongue-in-cheek bit that involved calling her hair and make-up folks onto the stage for a touch-up.

It was evidently supposed to be playful and self-deprecating, but the sense of fun was dampened by her poker-face delivery, probably due to the fact that she repeats the gag every night.

Sipping something from a champagne glass (she said it was water, Carey seemed to come to life a bit later, and made a point of referring to her new line of champagne.

On the whole, though, Carey gave an uninspired performance — one hopes her champagne isn’t quite so flat.

Source: The Ottawa Citizen