(Kompas.com)

Some 2,000 audience members — most of whom were in their late-30s to mid-40s — formed a massive impromptu choir and joined in with American rock-jazz fusion band Chicago as its front man Robert Lamm belted out the band’s classic hits at the Jakarta Plenary Convention Center on Saturday night.

The band sang dozens of their unforgettable hit ballads at the concert, including A Hard Habit to Break, If You Leave Me Now, Hard to Say I’m Sorry, You’re the Inspiration, Saturday in the Park and many more.

Lamm was accompanied by his band mates Lee Loughnane, James Pankow, Lou Pardini, Jason Scheff, Tris Imboden and Keith Howland at the one-night-only event. Another band member, saxophonist Walt Parazaider was unable to attend due to illness.

“Walter cannot be here. He is at home. He currently has a health problem and has to undergo an operation,” Lamm said during a press meet at the Hotel Sultan a few hours before the concert on Saturday, as quoted by kompas.com.

Parazaider was replaced by another saxophonist, Walfredo Reyes, in their Jakarta concert. “Reyes has been playing with us [in place of Parazaider] for the last four or five years. We truly hope that Parazaider will join us again sometime soon.”

The concert on Saturday was the second Chicago has performed in Jakarta, the band last rocked the city in 1993.

“When I came here in the early 1990s, we had a press junket, and I saw this big, tall guy with a nice smile. I was so impressed with that smile that I still remember it now,” Lamm said.

In the intervening 19 years between the two performances in Jakarta, Lamm said that the band members still enjoyed their time together, even after rocking the world for 45 years.

“We’ve done tours in North America, Europe, South Africa and Asia. We spend a lot of time together and it has been just great,” he said.

Formed in the eponymous “windy city” in the state of Illinois in 1967, Chicago has been through a long journey in the music industry; a journey which has earned the band recognition as one of the 13 best musical groups of all time by Billboard magazine.

Before taking the name Chicago, the band called itself The Big Thing and played cover versions of Top-40 songs. In 1968, the group changed its name to the Chicago Transit Authority, which was eventually shortened to Chicago when the actual Chicago Transit Authority filed complaints.

Chicago has experienced great success since its first album, also named “The Chicago Transit Authority”, the sales of which hit one million copies in 1969, achieving platinum status. Several songs from that album — Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?, Beginnings and Questions 67 and 68 — later became radio hit singles.

The band also won a Grammy award for the “Best Pop Performance by Duo or Group” in 1976 for the immensely popular hit ballad If You Leave Me Now featured on its “Chicago X” album.

Local musician Oddie Agam, who attended the show, was quoted by tempo.co as saying that he could not believe that the American band, one of his music idols, had returned to Jakarta.

“They are among my idols. When I used to play onstage in Singapore, I often played their songs,” said Oddie, who claims that he has been a fan of the band since their formative years. “It’s just awesome. Nothing has changed with the band [after 45 years]. They sound just the same.”

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