Ian Anderson, the frontman of Jethro Tull

British rockers Jethro Tull on November 27, American pop metal specialists Firehouse on December 19 — Calcutta is getting its share of international live acts after being passed up for years.

Half the tickets for Thursday’s Tull concert at Science City were sold the day the counters opened. By the time the sounds of that concert die down, the city will have its second big international music act of the year to look forward to: a Firehouse show at Tollygunge Club.

Ignored by almost every international performer touching down on Indian shores, Calcutta’s resurgence has been slow but sure. Stand-up comedian Russell Peters’s show on October 23 ushered in the season of high-visibility on-stage action, including an opera — Violetta, A Traviata — last Saturday, and a talk by Nobel laureate Nadine Gordimer on November 10.

Calcutta is also waking up to international fashion. If the Ferragamo exhibition on August 30 and the one by Valentino before that were appetisers, the city will soon have its first brush with an international design stalwart in the flesh. Dries van Noten, the star Belgian designer, is coming to town this December for a “very private event”.

So what, if anything, has changed for the city to be taken seriously? “Calcutta has always been a favourite venue because of audience support,” said Farhad Wadia, the CEO of E18, event managers for the Tull show, titled A Night with the Piper and the Princess.

E18 also brought Independence Rock, a 23-year-old national rock festival, to Calcutta for the first time this year. “A lot of big names like Michael Learns to Rock, Mr Big, Bryan Adams and even Firehouse had passed through the city in transit before. Starting with Firehouse, we hope to bring outdoor music of international repute back to the city,” said Varun Desai of Littlei, which is organising the Firehouse concert.

But the continuing lack of interest from sponsors is a worry for event organisers. The sponsors of the Tull show, an alcohol company, wanted to launch the tour in Calcutta as “it is one of their best markets”, but their enthusiasm is not shared by all. “The audience here is a fraction of the number of people expected to attend the Firehouse concert in Aizawl. The crowd there is expected to be 40,000-strong, as against 1,000 in Calcutta,” said Desai.

“The Aizawl show will cost us Rs 40 lakh. The budget for Calcutta is much less but we still haven’t found sponsors to cover 66 per cent of the expenses.”

Omer Haidar, the chairman of Showhouse, which brought Vengaboys to town in 2001 and has lined up a Scottish Chamber Orchestra collaboration with Amjad Ali Khan in Calcutta in February, said it was all about mileage. “If a sponsor is supporting a two-city tour, it makes sense to choose Mumbai and Delhi because that is where we can make the most noise.”

Tapan Desai, the vice-president of Congo Square, which organises the annual Jazz Fest and brought Herbie Hancock to the city in 2007, feels the impression that Calcutta is not a viable venue is “misplaced”.

“There are companies who would rather spend lakhs organising a concert in Aizawl than bring a band to Calcutta. But Calcutta is far more likely to give a better response in terms of actual audience representation on the day.”

Congo Square is expected to bring US-based Beatle Jazz and fusion groups Ahimsa and Naad for the next Jazz Fest edition in end-January.