Big names in rock combine forces for Bowie tribute at Orpheum

The guitarist known as Scrote learned about David Bowie’s Jan. 10, 2016, death during a break in a concert he was playing in Los Angeles.

By the time he was driving home, Scrote, who had been leading bands for several tribute concerts for the past 10 years, told himself he had to do the same for Bowie.

“Why don’t you pull people together?” he recalls telling himself. “Everyone has to get over their shock.”

With the help of actor and Bowie friend Gary Oldman, Scrote created and led the band for a four-hour concert with more than 70 performers, including singer Seal and actor Ewan McGregor, backed by several former Bowie band members.

“It was a cathartic experience and I think we raised $10,000 for charity,” he recalled. However, “by the time I got home, it had gone viral around the world. … I was besieged with requests to do it all around the world. I had to sit back and take it all in.”

After approval from Bowie’s estate, Scrote made plans to take the show on the road. That tour comes to Wichita’s Orpheum Theatre on Wednesday night.

Scrote initially said he wouldn’t tackle the tour unless he had two key musicians: Adrien Belew, a former member of Bowie and Frank Zappa’s bands, King Crimson and Talking Heads; and Todd Rundgren, known for both his work as a solo artist and with the band Utopia.

By the end of 2016, “Celebrating David Bowie” made a “quick international tour,” he said, including a date in London, down the street from the house Bowie grew up in, with “5,000 people singing every word.”

“Of course that just stirred up more dust,” he recalled, thinking “Wait a minute, I wasn’t planning on going this far.”

By 2018, the Bowie show was touring around the world, and plans were made to continue into 2020 – through delayed by COVID.

“It’s no longer fumbling forward,” Scrote said. “We’re doing it on purpose and doing proper touring.”

In a phone interview while visiting the Museum of Modern Art in New York, before a pair of concert dates in the Big Apple, Scrote said the performances are “fairly faithful renditions of the catalog.”

“They’re amped up a bit and we all bring our own take on them,” he said. “We’re not looking back. At what’s the best way to do the Bowie stuff. We don’t want to lose anybody. All the main melodies are there, and people can sing along. We might change the form a little bit, and do some medleys, but Bowie did that.”

The set list represents Bowie from 1969 through the 2000s, Scrote said, with at least 30 songs represented in full or medleys.

Rundgren takes most of the vocals, and he “doesn’t try to sing like Bowie, he sings like Todd Rundgren,” Scrote said. “And it works.”

Half of the band, he said, have some connection with Bowie and the other half considers themselves big fans. Scrote had friends in Bowie bands and had hung out with Ziggy Stardust but didn’t work with him professionally.

The musicians in “Celebrating David Bowie” have all put their egos in check while touring with the show, he said.

“These are all artists and musicians who are swamped all year long,” he said. “There’s no personal agenda, it’s just a love of the music with respect and appreciation for others who are on the show.”

The concert tour that began as a one-night tribute show is continuing to book dates into 2024, he said.

“David’s got such a rich catalog and a global fan base,” Scrote said. “Few artists have that kind of a fan base, where they want to hear it all worldwide.”

‘CELEBRATING DAVID BOWIE’

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 9

Where: Orpheum Theatre, 200 N. Broadway

Tickets: $69.50 to $129.50, from selectaseat.com