Paparazzi Parents

I covered the Kids R Rockin concert last Sunday, which was part of the James Burton International Guitar Festival. Basically hundreds of Caddo Parish school kids who are part of the Little Kids Rock program performed at Municipal Auditorium in downtown Shreveport and were entertained by James Burton himself, country music star Kix Brooks and other famous musical names.

Normally when we shoot concerts, we only have about two minutes at the beginning of the show to do our thing. We're escorted to the front of the stage, watched warily by a crew member and immediately removed from the venue almost before we're able to take a breath. Not so in this case. Photographers were able to stand next to the stage for as long as we wanted, which helped me get shots of numerous children playing their guitars throughout the afternoon.

The thing that amazed me was the constant stream of parents who would get out of their seats and come all the way to the front of the auditorium, camera(s) in hand, and take as many shots as they could of their children. Sometimes they stretched across the entire stage and were five people deep. It was a mad house!