Justin Timberlake

Tuesday night at the Air Canada Centre. Second show on Thursday, March 15.

Even with some of the most elaborate, sophisticated visual technology available at his disposal, pop superstar Justin Timberlake managed to have his campfire moment at the Air Canada Centre Tuesday night.

With a literal campfire.

About 72 minutes into the North American kickoff of his Man of the Woods tour, the Memphis native gathered on a stage with a few supporting vocalists of his Tennessee Kids entourage around burning flames, pulled out the acoustic guitar and allowed them to shine individually with their own interpretations of hits like Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams,” Lauryn Hill’s “Ex-Factor,” The Beatles’ “Come Together” and John Denver’s “Thank God, I’m A Country Boy.”

It was a dramatic, calming departure from what had been, up to that point, a very intricate, highly choreographed and rigidly disciplined demonstration of what has made Timberlake fans fall in love with him in the first place: his expressively elastic tenor with its soaring falsetto; neo-soul love songs of various tempos; spiced up semi-robotic, Michael Jackson-inspired footwork delivered by the singer and songwriter and his dancing sextet; and instrumental backing by 15 musicians, ranging from a tuba player/trombonist to a couple of keyboardists and a pair of drummers.

In fact, the sheer extravagance of the spectacle was in itself something to behold: an arena-length, winding catwalk featuring five performance areas — anchored at the centre by a circular bar — allowed practically every one of the estimated 18,000 spectators in attendance to spend some quality visual time with Timberlake at some point during his thoughtfully planned two-hour show.

And anyone who didn’t get a close-up was visually compensated by a complex system of thinly membraned screens that hovered above the venue floor, furling and unfurling to adjust to whatever graphic Timberlake had planned for the moment. The catwalk was also decorated with trees and one stage was occasionally covered with holographic grass, mimicking the appearance of a forest.

Of course, none of this would matter if it wasn’t for the music, and in this aspect, Timberlake delivered his performance flawlessly: aside from offering generous portions of his new Man Of The Woods — a not-so-veiled reference to his son Silas and the entertainer’s entrance into parenthood — he also delivered the hits that everyone wanted to hear and got into them fairly early.

“LoveStoned” was the third song in and Justin got his “SexyBack” by the fourth number; the crowd responded by dancing in exhilaration to the funky beat and participating in full-throated sing-along, later aping the call-and-response stanzas of the light-hearted “Senorita” from Justified and enjoying the jubilant “Rock Your Body” near the end of the show.

For his part, Timberlake seemed pleased with how show No. 1 went, stopping at one point to grab some shots for his band at the bar to salute “the wonderful city I always have a blast in” as well as offering a shout-out to Drake (who may or may not have been in the house).

For the record, Justin Timberlake hit it out of the park — his most well-rounded production yet.

The only drawback, from my seat in the stands, was that the sound was intermittently distorted due to the spectacle’s sheer volume during the faster numbers. So, if the ex-NSYNCer was aiming for any nuances at those moments, they were lost in the building’s acoustics. It’s probably something that will improve as the show continues, which it will do so in Toronto on Thursday and when it returns to the same venue on October 9.

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While Timberlake is a veteran performer by many standards, Scarborough’s Francesco Yates is still very much at the beginning of his career at 22. Yet as J.T.’s opening act, Yates served notice with his own animated, choreographing-heavy performance that he intends to enter the same lofty stratosphere occupied by Timberlake, Bruno Mars and Prince if given the chance.

Yates delivered some great singing, searing guitar work and a bevy of dance moves that had the crowd screaming for more.

A very satisfying double bill.

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