Jeff Beck is known for his 'dazzling instrumentals'. Anyone familiar with his music will be presumably buying a ticket wanting to listen to his live interpretation of these.

He's a very reserved character, and not comfortable with doing the 'front man' thing. He does interviews very rarely and it's obvious he's not comfortable with people asking him questions, paying him compliments or the rest of it.

I know exactly what you mean - if a performer can make you feel included, or appreciated or you just see a bit of the human side, then it makes them far more engaging. Imagine how great the gig would be if he told a few stories about playing in the 60s, cracked a few jokes etc. Or told us something about how the tune came to be written, or what had inspired it. I think in the folk world this is something that happens all the time and we sort of take it for granted. As far as I'm concerned it's an integral part of the experience.

In most other styles of music that I've seen, Rock, Jazz, Classical, etc you don't get much in the way of chat from the stage, generally. I saw Eric Clapton once or twice and he never said much either.