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The cheapest concert tickets for the 2011 Eric Clapton tour are hard to pin down because of the new pricing methods being employed by Live Nation and Ticketmaster. Eric Clapton tickets went on sale this week for several of his 2011 Clapton tour dates and Seattle appears to have the cheapest maximum ticket price of $155 per seat with service charges.

But, the Key Arena only has one price for all of the seats for Clapton’s concert where if you go to the Hp Pavilion in San Jose, Arco Arena in Sacramento or the MGM Grand in Las Vegas you can buy tickets for Clapton as low as $51.25 per seat. For these venues you do have a much higher maximum price per ticket with Sacramento at the highest at $169 per seat followed by San Jose at $164 and the MGM at $144 per seat.

It’s hard to understand how Live Nation and Ticketmaster come up with these pricing models but they don’t make a lot of sense with the Sacramento market in a tailspin with high unemployment and furloughed workdays for the many state workers. Unless your Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber or Taylor Swift your not going to sell more than one half of the Arco Arena and Eric Clapton will do the same with these kind of ticket prices.

The cheapest Eric Clapton tickets are currently at the Valley View Casino in San Diego. Prices run from $67 per ticket to a maximum of around $114 per ticket. For the most expensive Clapton tickets you would have to attend one of the concerts in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre where the starting price is $126 per seat and go up to $376 per ticket.

It seems that Live Nation and Ticketmaster are still working of trying to extract the maximum amount out of concert fans even if it means having drastically different prices in each city. Even the Ticketmaster service fees are different in each city. For a $95 ticket in Seattle the Ticketmaster fee is $20.01 per ticket but for a Clapton ticket for Portland the Ticketmaster fee is $17 for a $125 ticket. Go figure!

Eric Clapton 2011 Tour Dates and Ticketmaster Ticket Prices and Fees

February

26      Seattle, WA  Key Arena                               $115.01  ($95 + $20.01 conv. fee)

28      Portland,  OR Rose Garden                          $125 + $17 conv. fee = $142

March

  2     San Jose, CA  HP Pavilion                             $59 ($46.50+$12.50 conv. fee), $164.25 ($146.50 +17.75 conv. fee)

  3     Sacramento, CA Arco Arena                         $51.25 ($39.50 + $11.75), $169.30 ($149.50 +$19.80)

  5     Las Vegas, NV  MGM Grand                         $49.88 +$8.65 = $58.53, $78.75 +$10.60= $89.35, $131.25 + $12.80 = $144.05

  6     San Diego, CA   Valley View Casio Cntr akaSan Diego Arena  $55.50 +$11.65 = $67.15, $79.50 + $12.25=$91.75,  $99.50 + nothing was avail, not able to obtain fee on this price point $99+

  8     Universal City, CA  Gibson Ampitheatre        $126.25 ($89.50+16.75), $185.50 ($159.50 +26), $376 ($350 +26)

  9     Universal City, CA  Gibson Ampitheatre        $126.25 ($89.50+16.75), $185.50 ($159.50 +26), $376 ($350 +26)