| Tour by Kate Bush | |
 Cover of the tour programme | |
| Location | Europe |
|---|---|
| Associated album | |
| Start date | 2 April 1979 (warm up concert) |
| End date | 13 May 1979 |
| Legs | 1 |
| No. of shows | 28 |
| Kate Bush concert chronology | |
The Tour of Life (originally known as the "Lionheart Tour", and also officially referred to as the Kate Bush Tour)[a] was the first concert tour by English singer-songwriter and musician Kate Bush. Starting in April 1979, the tour lasted just over six weeks. The tour was acclaimed for its incorporation of mime, magic, and readings during costume changes The show contained 24 performances from Bush's first two albums The Kick Inside and Lionheart (both 1978), and new songs "Violin" and "Egypt" which would subsequently appear on Bush's third album Never for Ever (1980).
The tour is renowned for its use of new technology; because of Bush's determination to dance as she sang, her stage sound engineer Gordon Paterson developed the wireless headset microphone using a wire clothes hanger, making her the first singer to use such a device on stage. The staging also involved rear-screen projection and the accompaniment of two male dancers. The tour was notable for the death of Bush's lighting engineer, Bill Duffield, to whom one of the London shows was dedicated.
The tour was a critical and commercial success, with most dates selling out and additional shows being added due to high demand. Members of the Kate Bush Club were provided with a guaranteed ticket. The BBC filmed a special of the show entitled Kate Bush: On Tour. The documentary featured the production and staging of the set, and revealed the extent to which Bush was involved. Broadcast in 1979, it did not show any of the full performances. The concert spawned two physical releases, the EP On Stage (1979) as well as the home video Live at Hammersmith Odeon (1981). Live at the Hammersmith Odeon was later re-issued in 1994 as a boxed set including an audio CD of the broadcast as well as the video.
The name, "Tour of Life", was not coined until after its completion, with all promotional material referring to it simply as the Kate Bush Tour. Neither the EP nor the home video makes any reference to the name.
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