If you were at a concert in DC this week, you might have seen Jeanette Pagliuco. The Reston woman attended 27 concerts between August 1 and 8, exceeding the Guinness World Record for the most concerts attended in one week. Although she’s yet to submit her final records to Guinness, Pagliuco ended her streak with 5 more logged concerts than she needed, so she feels confident about her claim to the title.
Originally from Connecticut, Jeanette Pagliuco fell in love with DC’s live music scene a few years ago on a trip to see her adult son, who works in the city. “I was like, oh my God, on a Monday night, I can go listen to jazz, and the next day I can go listen to blues, and then I can see a rock show over the weekend,” she says. “The live music scene here is so concentrated. It was like nothing I had experienced before, and I knew I wanted to be closer to it.”
She moved to Reston a year and a half ago to be closer to both her son and the tunes, and she quickly started a Meetup group called NoVA Live Music Mingle where she and more than 1,000 other music aficionados plan concert trips. She wondered how many it would be feasible to attend in just one week and found out the current record-holder, a Dutch DJ, attended 21 concerts in seven days in 2016. He flew between countries to claim the title, but Pagliuco knew she wouldn’t even need to leave the DC area to exceed him. She contacted the Guinness book for guidelines and began planning earlier this year.
From August 1-8, Pagliuco went to more than 10 venues across DC and Northern Virginia, from Jiffy Lube Live to Woodrow Wilson Plaza. She’s usually drawn to metal and alternative rock acts—her favorite DC concert ever was Smashing Pumpkins—but she says the challenge drew her out of her comfort zone. In the past week, she’s seen a string quartet, a mariachi band, and even the US Marine Drum Corps. Her favorite show from the week? She was excited to see REO Speedwagon on Tuesday, but she had to give a shoutout to her friends in the Herndon-based rock cover band the Pool Boys. “I love seeing big national shows, but there’s really nothing like seeing a DMV band that you know you can see again sometime soon,” she says.
The endeavor wasn’t always easy—a week of bad weather left Pagliuco with rain-soaked clothes and a few changed plans— but to her it felt like a community effort. At stops along the way, fellow Meetup group members came out to support her. “They would always call and ask if I needed some water or a sandwich, and at my record-breaking concert, they set up a little party with balloons shaped like the number 22,” she said. “I don’t know if I could’ve made it through without that encouragement.”
Pagliuco finished her streak at Madam’s Organ last night, where local act Latin Blues Funk jammed late into the night. As her musical escapade comes to an end, Pagliuco says she is tired but glad she did it. “People are always shocked that I have the energy to do this but I feel like I’m a 56-year-old with a 30-year-old’s spirit,” she says. “My passion and excitement for music is giving me the stamina to do it. I really think you are what you listen to, and I just want people in the area to see how lucky they are that there’s a diverse array of performances every day right outside their doors.”
