Prepare Ye The Way of the Lord is played.
The voice of my first guest this
evening comes from Michael Ball, he comes to us with a double CD, one of
which has been at the Albert Hall on the road recently, the other is a
gorgeous new Christmas CD. Michael, welcome back to the programme.
Michael: It's always nice
to be here.
Sheridan: It's been a busy
year on the road. More concerts than Musical shows.
Michael: It's funny, since
Passion which I did, it must be two and a half, three years ago, there
hasn't been anything that sort of enticed me back, that's really excited
me and it's getting a bit worrying. It's a big commitment as you
know, eight shows a week, six days a week, and you can't do anything else.
If the right thing came along I'd do it, it's finding it.
Sheridan: I remember saying
on this show 'You have to do Passion' and to my amazement you then did.
My advice is very seldom taken so I was delighted. It was a brave
score to do - not a huge commercial hit, but then Sondheim never is really.
But it was really exciting ...
Michael: It was the only writer
I hadn't worked with and I had a brilliant, brilliant time doing it and
very pleased I did.
Sheridan: What's very good
about the Albert Hall Concert which we have the CD now and I was there
when you did that first, is that you really do encourage, some might say
bully the audience, into going to Musical Theatre. You point out
that these songs don't just exist on CD or radio, they are part of shows
and these shows have to live. You clearly feel very strongly about
the survival of musical.
Michael: Yes, if you look
back in history, you look at the classic songs, the great songs, so many
have come through Musical Theatre, and they're the kind of songs that appeal
to me because they have an intelligent lyric, they have a point to them,
they mean something. They can be taken out of context, but when seen
in context of the show, the classic is Empty Chairs At Empty Tables from
Les Mis, it works now as a solo song about loss and about despair and tragedy.
You see it in the context of the show and you see the people whose friends,
Marius' friends around him, who have died, and it has an added poignancy.
It's the same with all of those songs, Aspects of Love, Love Changes Everything.
When you see the Aspects of Love that Alex has gone through, that song
has greater importance.
Sheridan: And these of course
are roles that you created, you came up through musicals, in a way that
many great concert stars now simply haven't had that dramatic material.
Michael: No, no, no.
I think there are two ways really of going into the concert world - either
you pay your dues doing the clubs and small pubs if you are a rock band
or whatever or you come through stage craft. Because it is a discipline,
it's hard work, and if you manage to get through the system of working
six days a week, eight shows, then you get that stamina and you get to
understand how to work an audience. You get to understand, I direct
the shows as well myself, and this one was a two and a half hour, I did
both halves of it, which was great because I got to choose all the material
that I wanted and take the audience on that journey that they get in a
theatre. It's not just standing behind a microphone and singing.
Sheridan: And in the same
box we also have the Christmas album, a wonderful collection from everything
from Carols to Crosby to Elaine Paige who is now doing the King and I,
but that's some sign of the times that as you say there are not many musicals
around and there is a limit to how many revivals we can keep doing.
Michael: Yes, and the one's
that are coming seem to be based on things that have already been like
the Lion King and I don't know if you ....
Sheridan: Indeed, I think
it's visually wonderful, but I have doubts about the book and the score
...
Michael: But I don't think
that that matters
Sheridan: It's a great treat
...
Michael: Exactly. What
Beauty and the Beast kind of should have been. It's that huge spectacular,
such clever use of stage cloth and shadow play ...
Sheridan: I would say that
Beauty and the Beast had more kind of heart and drama, I've got grandsons
now and the Lion King is certainly an absolutely visual epic but somehow
Beauty and the Beast you cared more about the people, maybe because in
Lion King they are animals so you don't care that much. What its
not is an adult musical.
Michael: It's not scratching
the boundaries of the audience.
Sheridan: What is interesting
at the moment is that having almost exhausted Broadway and apparently the
West End where we are now getting these vast shows in Paris - there's the
Hunchback and two or three other things. Suddenly the French who
never seemed to like Musicals - Les Mis, the guys had to come here to live
and work because everyone in France said Musicals were what closes on Saturday,
now suddenly Paris is full of huge new musicals.
Michael: But will they translate?
Sheridan: It remains to be
seen. They are going to try with Hunchback.
Michael: I know. I listened
to it and there are some very very inspirational fantastic songs in there
but whether the whole show in itself will appeal to the musical sensibilities
of this country I don't know ...
Sheridan: We just don't know.
But there again it goes back to your Les Mis and to
Cameron and indeed to Boublil and Schonberg, the French have finally caught
up with what they were doing here thirteen or twenty years ago. How
do you see the future, is it going to be concerts and being on the road
all the time or will you still search for a script.
Michael: I've been lucky,
I've been able to dip in and out of so many different areas of the business
and I intend to keep doing that. I look at everything that comes
through the letter box, you can't pigeon hole yourself, it's why I chose
when I came back from Broadway from doing Aspects, to do something as daft
as the Eurovision Song Contest because it was a different platform to do
a different kind of music and I want to continue doing that but I would
dearly love to find a show that
I believe in and that I think would work and that people would want to
see.
Sheridan: Do you still not,
with that in mind, I know that your father is to some extent in the business,
as a great impresario, but did you know early on you were going to do West
End Musicals or concerts.
Michael: No, I went and studied
as an actor at Guildford and I didn't know anything about my voice.
I still never trained. It was only because our final show, The Class
of '84 at Guildford, you're given two three minute slots within the final
show for agents and producers and casting directors and so on, and it occurred
to me that if I have two three minute acting slots that doesn't make much
of an impression, so I persuaded them to let me do a rock'n'roll number
at the end, a sort of pastiche rock'n'roll number which they did, so I
was cast in Godspell, in Aberystwyth and from there the voice came into
play. I was around at that time when those great new musicals were
being written and cast. Cameron came and saw me in Pirates of Penzance,
which is the second job I did, and the only part they hadn't cast was Marius.
They took me down for an audition, which I did, they played Empty Chairs
At Empty Tables, because I don't read music. I have to rely on my
instinct and my ear, and I knew this was a great song. I absolutely
felt it, I learned it very quickly and sang it for them, went away and
didn't hear anything, by which time I was then told come back in a week's
time. I heard a lot about Les Mis in that week, that it was going
to be an entirely through sung musical, virtually an opera, the RSC were
doing it and it was a big deal. The important thing being that it
was not a book musical. I then came back down to meet with Trevor
Nunn and the rest of the writing team, and got up and I sang Empty Chairs
which I now knew very well and was really pleased with the way it had gone,
and Trevor came up to me as only Trevor can, put his arms around me and
said, "that was absolutely lovely, now I just want to have a chat, if we
were to offer you a non-singing role within this production would you be
happy to take it". And I swear this is true. I said, "But I'm
not really very good at stage management". (Both laughing)
And he went sorry, I said well, I can't do that, I'll try, I'm quite
prepared but I think you'd have someone better than that. He went,
"No, I meant, oh nevermind Michael ...."
Sheridan: Would you now go
back in a way to stage acting without music if a play came along?
Michael: Of course, yes, I
think people would find it difficult to cast me, I mean you make a rod
for your own back, because I have a name now as a singer and a concert
performer, people may feel it would be difficult to accept me in a straight
role as another character, and because I haven't done that for so long
they may feel, well, perhaps we would be better off taking a punt with
somebody who knows what they are doing. They might cast me as a novelty
value and I hope that I would justify that by giving the right kind of
a performance, but you know ...
Sheridan: But for now it's
coming up to Christmas, we have the CD, where are you in fact for Christmas?
Michael: I'm in England for
actual Christmas Day and I fly off, this is fabulous, I fly off to Kuala
Lumpa to do a big concert out there with the Italien Symphony Orchestra
which is filmed right round the whole of Malaysia, it goes out live for
the Millenium Night, and then two weeks on an island somewhere just to
get over it.
Sheridan: That was the last
time I found you actually in Antigua, you're good at islands. Michael
Ball there talking about a wonderful new double - it's the concert, The
Very Best Of Michael Ball which was on the road and the Albert Hall and
also the Christmas Album. Thank you very much indeed.
