Oh, Dueling Pianos! I had such high hopes for this experience, and it's really unfortunate that one…read moreinteraction with Noah, managed to ruin what could have been a great night.
Let's start with the good, because there actually was a lot of it:
Security -- great. Funny, charismatic, and welcoming as we entered.
Bar staff -- great. Attentive, helpful, and quick with our food and drinks. They checked in on us regularly throughout the night.
Drinks -- delicious. Well-balanced and flavorful.
Food -- great for an after-dinner outing. The truffle fries and potato skins were perfect snacks.
Other customers/patrons -- AMAZING. The people around us were fun, friendly, and clearly there to have a good time.
With all of those positives, I really wish I could give Dueling Pianos a much better review. Sadly, the reason we actually went, The Dueling Pianos Show, is also the reason I don't think we'll ever return. Our group of four arrived a little after 9 PM on a Saturday night. We happily paid the $20/person cover because I've been here before and always had an amazing experience.
It was "Requests Night," so patrons were invited to submit song requests along with a monetary contribution. After spending $80 just to get in and another $200 on food and drinks, we felt a $5 contribution for a song was reasonable. Apparently, Noah didn't. We requested anything by Mac Dre or Too $hort, or, if needed, "All the Small Things" by Blink-182. One of the musicians on stage was absolutely amazing! He was incredibly talented and honestly worth watching on his own. Unfortunately, throughout the evening, Noah repeatedly made comments implying that if you actually wanted your requested song played, you needed to contribute more than $10. Side note: Apparently Noah's wife was also at the show that evening, which made his repeated emphasis on how much money people needed to give him for requests even more interesting. It was a little sad that the money seemed to become such a major focus of the performance.
After about 90 minutes without hearing our request, we decided to cancel it and request our $5 back through Venmo. Could we have just left the $5 as a tip? Absolutely. But earlier in the evening, Noah had publicly joked about another customer accidentally "requesting" money instead of "paying" through Venmo. We thought requesting our $5 back might give him another opportunity for some lighthearted comedic relief. It did not!
Instead, Noah became offended and proceeded to improvise a song about us, calling us out by name and disrespecting us in front of the entire room. What could have been a funny, harmless interaction quickly became uncomfortable and unnecessarily mean spirited.
And apparently, we weren't the only ones who felt that way. Two parties who had just entered saw what was happening and immediately decided to leave in support of us. Another customer, someone we didn't even know, went to the bar staff because he was so disappointed by how we were being treated. He even told them, "I really don't think they should pay for anything here." That honestly meant a lot. So did the bartender's response. He encouraged me to write this review and said he would be informing his manager about what happened.
I understand what Dueling Pianos is. It's live music. It's comedy. It's audience interaction. You might get teased. You might become part of the joke. But there is a difference between playful crowd work and publicly humiliating paying customers because you're upset they requested their $5 back. That distinction matters. And, for the record, we never actually received that $5 back, despite Noah repeatedly insisting, while berating us from the stage, that he had returned it.
I have great memories of this place pre-COVID. Saturday nights used to mean a line around the corner, a packed dance floor, and barely a table available. Last night, the venue seemed maybe 50% full. I genuinely hope this experience isn't representative of what Dueling Pianos has become. The staff treated us well. The drinks and food were great. One of the musicians was incredibly talented. And the kindness shown to us by complete strangers was probably the best part of the evening. But unfortunately, Noah's behavior overshadowed all of it. One performer turned what should have been a fun girls' night out into an experience that lost not only our patronage, but the recommendations we would have given to our friends. And that's really a shame, because we came ready to have a great time.
