Alabama, in Wichita, early 90's, as a group outing with wife's work; and, Garth at stadium last year. Funny part is I am not a country or western fan at all.

Is it possible for a middle aged person to never have been to a venue with live music? How does one avoid such things? And still know enough about music to want to go see Bob Seger and Billy Joel.

I've been in venues with live music plenty of times, but Robert's Western World is not a "concert."

I'm having trouble thinking of more than two "concerts," in the sense of an event where the primary purpose for attending is to see people play guitars.

I guess I have three: Memphis Music Festival 2002, Blues Traveler and Drive by Truckers at Mud Island in maybe 2004, and Rodney Atkins at the Delaware County Fair in probably 2006. I cannot recall another instance where I went somewhere, much less paid money, for the express purpose of seeing contemporary or popular music plaid live.

I've been going to concerts for 30 years. I would guess my total is in the hundreds. There were times in my late twenties I would see 8-12 a month.

they were teenagers. Which just continues my family’s traditions of going to see a fair amount of live music. I was probably ten when I saw Neil Diamond, but I’m not even sure that was my first actual concert. I can’t even imagine a college experience or pre-children life without going to see dozens of concerts a year.

(Also, I can get to four in my previous post: I saw Ben Folds during undergrad in 2007.)

But almost all of the live music I have consumed has been classical: I've seen the LA Philharmonic, the Chicago Lyric Opera, the local symphonies and opera companies in Memphis and Nashville, the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the Czech National Symphony Orchestra, Itzhak Perlman, and a host of other classical soloists and chamber ensembles. We took our then-six-year-old to see Perlman, and my parents took my siblings and I to such things as kids. The Memphis Symphony used to play great summer concerts outdoors, which were a lot of fun.

What I haven't done is devote a bunch of time and energy to popular music, something I simply don't find sufficiently culturally valuable or personally fulfilling to warrant that kind of attention.