The Miseducation Tour
The Miseducation Tour was the debut solo concert tour by American rapper and singer-songwriter Lauryn Hill. It was launched in the support of her debut solo studio album The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. Although no immediate tour was planned in support of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, the tour commenced in Tokyo, Japan on January 21, 1999. After 70 shows across Japan, North America, and Europe, the tour concluded in Gainesville, Virginia on August 15, 1999.
Alongside songs from The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, the set list for The Miseducation Tour incorporated songs Hill had recorded as a member of the Fugees, as well as covers of songs by other artists. The tour was sponsored by Armani and Levi Strauss & Co., which was seen as a pioneering approach to collaborations between brands and artists. Outkast, Busta Rhymes, The Roots, Slick Rick, and Choclair joined Hill as opening acts for different dates across North America. The tour received widespread critical acclaim, primarily directed towards Hill's showmanship and vocal performance. A commercial success, its numerous dates sold out upon announcement. Retrospectively, The Miseducation Tour has been credited with introducing arena touring among hip-hop artists and popularizing hip-hop, reggae, and dancehall among mainstream audiences.
Background and development
In August 1998, Lauryn Hill released her debut solo studio album The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. Recorded after her group Fugees embarked on a hiatus, the album was released to universal critical acclaim, and swiftly propelled Hill to ubiquitous recognition. It debuted atop the US Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 422,000 units, breaking numerous chart and sales records. Initially, there was no immediate tour planned in support of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, due to the album not needing further promotion and Hill being pregnant with her second child Selah, whom she gave birth to in November 1998. However, Hill soon recruited a band and began rehearsing for what would become The Miseducation Tour. She strived to alter arrangements of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill tracks, so as to avoid tedium and repetition. The tour was formally announced in December 1998, with the first US leg set to commence in Detroit on February 18, 1999. Considering Hill's popularity in Japan, the country was chosen as the location for the tour's start, with four shows between January 21–25, so Hill and her band would have a chance to "shake down, and work out the musical problems that inevitably happened at the beginning of any big tour", before embarking on the US leg.The Miseducation Tour was sponsored by Italian luxury fashion house Armani, as well as American clothing brand Levi Strauss & Co., both of whom supplied Hill and her band with wardrobe for the tour. Through the sponsorship, Armani endorsed its then-new Emporio Armani fragrance line, while a Levi's advertisement for the tour was featured in the August 1999 issue of Vogue. In January 1999, it was disclosed that American hip-hop duo Outkast would serve as the opening act for the US shows, in support of their third studio album Aquemini, a decision Hill elaborated by stating: "A brethren of mine said that they remind him of the deacons of the church, they just strong but positive. And that's what I've always tried to be. There's nothing corny about what we do." Outkast returned as the opening act for the tour's subsequent US shows throughout July and August 1999, alongside rappers Busta Rhymes and Slick Rick, and hip-hop band The Roots. For the summer shows, the tour was also referred to as the Everything Is Everything Tour, with Hill opting for larger venues, such as arenas, rather than clubs and theaters, at which she performed throughout the first US leg. Having visited Japan, Europe, and North America, The Miseducation Tour finished after the summer leg, as Hill refrained from extending the tour further due to obligations to her family and difficulties she had experienced touring with the Fugees. An additional show was planned for Honolulu in October 1999, but was ultimately canceled shortly after announcement. According to biographer Chris Nickson, Hill was unwilling to make the tour "more grueling and draining. She'd come to know that there was much more to life than a career."
Concert synopsis
For The Miseducation Tour, Hill was accompanied by a 17-member band, which constisted of three background vocalists, three keyboardists, three hornists, two guitarists, two percussionists, a bassist, a rapper, and two disc jockeys. Numerous critics noted Hill's simplistic wardrobe for the concerts, which often incorporated denim items from Levi Strauss & Co. The shows began with a recording of Bob Marley's "Redemption Song" played before Hill entered the stage. In select concerts, Hill began her set by performing an organ-accompanied rendition of the gospel hymn "His Eye Is on the Sparrow" before walking towards the stage, while in others she would immediately perform a gospel-styled version of "Ex-Factor", against a backdrop displaying a stained-glass window effect. The gospel stylings continued with "Superstar", fusing with the song's hip-hop quality, before Hill transitioned into a medley of the Fugees' "Fu-Gee-La" and "Ready or Not", and Hill's collaboration with Nas "If I Ruled the World ". The medley was followed by "Every Ghetto, Every City" and "Lost Ones", with the latter accelerated into a jagged rap-funk number interspersed with elements of calypso, dancehall, and reggae toasting. Mary J. Blige joined Hill on stage during the show at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York City on March 23, 1999, to reprise their collaboration "I Used to Love Him".Halfway through shows, Hill would exit the stage to change her clothing, while DJ Supreme and DJ Leon Higgins—the band's disc jockeys—would mix various songs by other artists on a turntable, including Jay-Z's "Can I Get A...", Sean Combs' "It's All About the Benjamins", Run-DMC's "Peter Piper", and The Notorious B.I.G.'s "Hypnotize". Alongside the disc jockeys, the band's drummer performed a solo with a snare drum and cymbals before playing Audio Two's "Top Billin'" on empty buckets. As Hill returned to the stage, she, alongside background vocalists and instrumentalists, engaged in a 20-minute old-school hip-hop-inspired contest against the disc jockeys and rapper Ademola McMullen, during which Hill performed several covers, including those of The Jackson 5's "I Want You Back" and Stevie Wonder's "Sir Duke", against contemporary turntablism and rap interference, asking the audience to judge the contest. Afterwards, she performed a rearranged version of "When It Hurts So Bad" infused with dub-influenced breaks, improvised lyrical alterations, and experimental instrumentation; "Forgive Them Father" was performed in a similar manner. Sitting on a classroom chair, Hill then performed "To Zion", with the song's subject, Hill's then-19-month-old son Zion David Marley, briefly joining her on stage during the performance at the CSU Convocation Center in Cleveland on March 21, 1999. Carlos Santana reprised his classical guitar contribution to the song during the concert at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco on March 2. Hill would frequently close the main set with "Doo Wop ", before performing an encore of "Killing Me Softly" and "Everything Is Everything".
Reception and attendance
The Miseducation Tour was both a critical and commercial success. In a commentary on the tour's opening concert at Nippon Budokan in Tokyo on January 21, 1999, Philip Brasor of The Japan Times positively compared Hill's "modern-soul vocal trappings" to her studio vocal performance on The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. Caroline Sullivan of The Guardian described the February 5 concert at the Brixton Academy in London as "casually chaotic" due to a large number of band members, but nonetheless commended Hill's stage presence and vocal performance. Gil Kaufman of MTV News praised the concert at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco, emphasizing Hill's energetic performance and the show's celebratory atmosphere. Similarly, an anonymous editor of MTV News called the concerts at the Universal Amphitheatre in Los Angeles "energetically flawless", while another editor for the publication praised the first of three concerts at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York as "triumphant".Though Richard Harrington of The Washington Post commended Hill for being an assured performer during The Miseducation Tour's stop at the DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. on March 16, 1999, he was ambivalent towards the overemphasis of covers in the set list, Hill being overpowered by her band, and the performance of Outkast. On the contrary, Michael David of Cleveland Scene praised Outkast's performance at the CSU Convocation Center in Cleveland. Reviewing the July 22 concert at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim for Los Angeles Times, Robert Hilburn hailed Hill's engaging and vigorous performance style, accentuating Hill's "uplifting, even electrifying spirit" which persevered after a transition from smaller to larger venues between the tour's two US legs. He also commended Busta Rhymes for his "lively" set. Hill was the second most-voted artist on The Washington Posts readers' poll of best concerts for 1999, behind Bruce Springsteen.
According to biographer Chris Nickson, all four dates of The Miseducation Tour in Japan sold out right after they were announced. February–March 1999 shows in Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and New York City were originally scheduled as singular dates, but were expanded after being sold out. The concert at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium was also sold out. The February 18 show at the Fox Theatre in Detroit earned over $186,000. The two consecutive dates at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta grossed $440,307, being the seventh highest-grossing concerts of the first half of March. The March 28–29 dates at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby Township, Pennsylvania were both sold out, grossing $223,655. With average earnings of $246,660 per concert, Hill was the 10th highest-grossing touring artist of the first quarter of 1999, according to Pollstar. However, the second US leg, during which Hill performed at considerably larger venues, was not as successful, with the concert at the Coors Amphitheatre in San Diego recording an attendance of 7,489, equal to 37,45 percent of the venue's capacity of 20,000. Regardless of the attendance, Hill earned a reported $250,000 per show during the leg.
Numerous celebrities were in attendance at The Miseducation Tour shows, with Sean Combs and comedian Rosie O'Donnell attending the March 23 concert at The Theater at Madison Square Garden, while actors Harrison Ford and Casey Affleck, actress Natalie Portman, and television personality Star Jones attended the March 24 show at the same venue. The sold-out three concerts at the Universal Amphitheatre attracted singer Janet Jackson, rapper and actress Queen Latifah, musicians Bono and Babyface, actresses Salma Hayek, Shannen Doherty, Pamela Anderson, Tori Spelling, Christina Applegate, Reese Witherspoon, and Drew Barrymore; actors Ryan Phillippe, Val Kilmer, and Edward Norton, and basketball player Magic Johnson. Furthermore, fashion designer John Galliano and singer-songwriter Nina Simone attended the May 27 concert at Le Zénith in Paris and joined Hill onstage, while a 10-year-old Adele attended the concert at the Brixton Academy.