The ticket read, "The Beyoncé Experience," a grand, bold declarative statement that says, "This is more than a mere concert where Beyoncé Knowles will sing and dance for you. This is a happening."

(It also sounds disturbingly like the title of a show made up of drag queens or tribute artists, where it's not really Beyoncé but the experience of what it would have almost have been like if you were, indeed, seeing Beyoncé and not some chick in a Beyoncé wig.)

Thankfully, it was indeed Miss Beyoncé - former Destiny's Child lead singer, Golden Globe-nominated actress and neo-diva - up there on the BankAtlantic Center stage Sunday night. And it was, indeed, more than just "I'm singing this song now" - there was a full all-female rock band, backing singers dressed like the '60s chanteuses in her recent Dreamgirls movie, several criminally good-looking dancers, several costume changes and a wind machine.

Wind machines, in case you're wondering, automatically equal "a happening." Look it up.

With a theatricality that rivals the Vegas heyday of Ann-Margret or all 87 stops of Cher's farewell tour, the power-stomping of Tina Turner and the all-encompassing divahood of '80s-era Diana Ross, Knowles commanded the very large room from the moment she rose from a hole in the stage to sing Crazy in Love. That's a heck of a show-stopping first number - it throws down the concert gauntlet and says, "I'm so fly, I can start with one of my signatures because I've got more where that came from. Recognize!"

The dancing, stomping and costume changing continued with the naughty Freak'em Dress, the excellently sassy Greenlight, Beautiful Liar, which in its recorded version is a duet with the equally diva-tastic Shakira, and Baby Boy, during which she shimmied in a green sparkly bra top and probably knocked out half the dudes (and a few of the ladies) in the audience.

It's not just that Knowles is ridiculously beautiful or that her blond hair blows so luxuriously in the fake wind or that she's got a great, distinctive voice. It's that she can combine all that stuff into a good performance - during Greenlight, she ran from one end of the stage to the other, singing "Green means go," moving steadily on crazy high heels at a speed most runners in fancy track shoes can't manage.

If there was any criticism, it would be that there were occasionally too many people onstage, what with the band situated in tiers and all the singers and dancers and disco balls.

Then again, it's all about the experience, and sometimes an experience has to risk being overwhelming to slam its theatrical point home.

By Leslie Gray Streeter,
Palm Beach Post