2024 marks Ball Arena’s 25th year of hosting sports and concert events. But let’s face it – when you are an uncle, and you get to take your 13-year-old niece to see Beyonce and Destiny’s Child on the 2001 TRL Tour, it doesn’t get any better than that.
OK, for you, maybe it does. Top 10 lists are nothing if not subjective.
But my family had a full circle moment in 2022, when my nephew and his wife took that very same niece’s 13-year-old daughter to see Billie Eilish at Ball Arena.
So many great concerts. So many genres. So many ruptured eardrums.
The venue opened as the Pepsi Center in 1999 and was renamed Ball Arena by the Ball Corporation in 2020. For concerts, the capacity can be as high as 20,000. We asked Denver Gazette readers to share their most memorable concerts. Here are a subjective few of the very best:
1. The $180 million Pepsi Center opened on Oct. 1, 1999, with a sold-out performance by Celine Dion, who dedicated the concert to the victims and survivors of the Columbine High School massacre. And she donated all proceeds from the show to Colorado Organization of Victim Assistance. The dish from Denver Gazette reader Dave DeMichelis: “She ended up singing ‘Respect’ with my band at the patron afterparty.”
2. Stevie Wonder’s nearly four-hour “Songs in the Key of Life” tour stop on March 17, 2015, celebrated his entire 1976 masterwork and featured surprise visits from jazz legends Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea. “It was a very special show because he brought his daughter along for that performance, making the song ‘Isn’t She Lovely’ hit even harder, because it was about her,” said Denver Gazette reader Jenna Moll Reyes. Wonder’s massive band included a 12-piece string section from the Colorado Symphony.
3. When Bruce Springsteen came to Denver on Nov. 19, 2012, it was for the first time after the death of saxophonist Clarence Clemons. The show opened with a cover of Bob Seger’s “Get Out of Denver” – the only time Springsteen played the song anywhere on that tour. “The show was just as much of a celebration of his life and his contribution to music as it was a chance for everyone to mourn his loss,” said Denver Gazette reader Luke Rahmsdorff-Terry.
Elton John performs Bennie And The Jets at Ball Arena as part of his Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour on Friday, Nov. 4, 2022, in Denver, Colo. (Timothy Hurst/The Gazette)
4. Houston's loss was Denver's gain when Elton John added a Denver stop to his farewell tour on Nov. 4, 2022. Because the Houston Astros were in the World Series, the Houston date was canceled and given to Denver. Let it be forever said that the final song John ever played in the Mile High City was “Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road.”
Watch Elton John's "Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour" at Ball Arena in Denver on Nov. 4, 2022.
5. Prince played the Pepsi Center on Aug. 28, 2004, five months after his induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. His 33-song set (ending with “Purple Rain”) began with a clip from his induction speech. As great as that night was, his more intimate stop at the Ogden Theatre in March 2013 was one for the history books.
6. The Simon and Garfunkel reunion tour stopped in Denver on Oct. 30, 2003. It opened with “Old Friends,” and closed with “Feelin' Groovy.” How can it get any better than that? Yet another one of my nieces opined: “It was absolutely magical – even better than Green Day – somehow.” Paul Simon would later return with Sting – and they played some of each other’s songs.
7. Denver Gazette readers mentioned Paul McCartney’s Nov. 1, 2005, concert more than any other– by far. “Paul McCartney breathed soul into my many future lives,” said Kit Kennedy. “I cried like angels were holding me like a baby.”
8. Cher’s May 28, 2014, co-headlining appearance (at age 68!) with Cyndi Lauper, who was hot as ever with her new Broadway musical “Kinky Boots,” was an off-the-charts spectacle. "Give me a friggin' break,” Cher told the crowd. “I've been a friggin' diva for more than 40 friggin' years." Girls most definitely had fun.
Watch U2 at Ball Arena in Denver on June 7, 2015.
9. U2’s hit-laden Innocence + Experience tour spanned from nostalgic to political on June 7, 2015, opening with “The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)” and ending with Ben E. King’s “Stand By Me.” One Denver reviewer called it “intense, classically contradictory, gloriously indulgent and endlessly generous.”
10. Mötley Crüe’s final tour (with Alice Cooper) came to Denver, well, a couple of times, lastly on July 31, 2015. I mean, come on: The heavy-metal thrashers opened with “So Long, Farewell” from “The Sound of Music.” “Watching Tommy Lee do a loop-de-loop over the Pepsi Center while strapped to his drum kit was mind-blowing,” said Denver Gazette reader Heather Iris Holt. The tour was called “All Bad Things Must Come to an End.”
And to everyone who wrote in nominating Madonna, Roger Waters, Miley Cyrus, Lady Gaga, Neil Diamond, Billy Joel, Bryan Adams, Green Day, Depeche Mode, Sade, Lizzo, Janet Jackson, Tool, Pantera, Bette Midler, Peter Gabriel when he sang in the middle of the arena while moving around in a plastic ball like a dog, Tina Turner, Shakira, Queen (with Adam Lambert), Carrie Underwood, Coldplay, Keith Urban, Alanis Morrisette, Garbage, My Chemical Romance, Garth Brooks, Michael Bublé, Bonnie Raitt, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pearl Jam, Tom Petty, Def Leppard, Poison, Kacey Musgraves, Nine Inch Nails, Queens of the Stone Age, Justin Bieber and about 100 others … I apologize. I only had 10 slots!
TEN CONCERTS COMING TO BALL ARENA
- May 30: Stevie Nicks
- May 31: Brooks & Dunn
- June 16: Janet Jackson
- June 17: Megan Thee Stallion
- June 27: Blink 182
- June 8: New Kids on the Block
- July 16: Missy Elliott
- July 22: Jennifer Lopez
- July 30: Olivia Rodrigo
- July 31: Alanis Morissette
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