Lowestoft's Marina Theatre Mon 09/02/09

[drew]

VALENTINES TOUR - FEBRUARY 2009
HAYLEY WESTENRA AND JONATHAN ANSELL

Lowestoft Journal

Marina gala night for top singers

31 October 2008

LEADING classical music stars Hayley Westenra and Jonathan Ansell have been secured for an exclusive performance at Lowestoft's Marina Theatre, The Journal can reveal today.

They will perform together during a special gala evening on Monday, February 9, as part of the venues autumn/winter line up, which will be announced next week.

This latest news for the Edwardian theatre is set to further enhance the reputation for attracting big names and high profile events to the east coast.

Martin Halliday, theatre manager said: “We are delighted to confirm that these high profile artistes have been secured for the Marina, over the next few weeks full details of our winter season will be announced and with the return of the magnificent Russian Ice Stars next week, West End hit Buddy at the end of the month and our first major professional pantomime, Peter Pan in December, our audiences have a great deal to look forward to over the coming months. It is a very exciting time for the theatre.”

Hayley was first recognised for her talents at just six years old, when she was picked at school to take the lead singing the role of Little Star in her Christmas play.

Her teacher informed her parents she thought the 19-year-old had real talent and by the age of 11 she began busking with friends in her native New Zealand.

It was soon decided Hayley needed a world stage and after being signed with Decca in London she recorded Pure, where it went triple Platinum here alone.

Now a third album has been released and she has a crate full of platinum discs to her name, as well as a catalogue of stars such as Andrea Bocelli and Jose Carreras, who she has performed duets with.

Jonathan Ansell, the charismatic young singer with the sensational tenor voice shot to fame three years ago with pop opera group G4 on the X Factor, but has now established himself as a bona fide solo star.

He achieved amazing success with the classically-trained group G4, who announced their split in early 2007. But surpassing this, he has now achieved a debut solo album that topped the classical charts and also hit the top ten of the pop charts.

Brought up in Bognor Regis where both his parents were primary school teachers, and influenced by his mother's tapes of Pavarotti and the Three Tenors, Jonathan, joined the West Sussex Boys Choir at the age of eight.

He went to the Guildhall School of Music when he was 18 and it was during his student days that he started busking in Covent Garden with friends, to make ends meet.

When the X Factor auditions were advertised on TV, he persuaded his busking chums from the Guildhall to enter, and the rest is television history.

“My secret dream was always to be able to stand in front of an audience who had come just to see me, rather than because of the music I was singing, which is often how it works in classical music. I always, in my heart of hearts, hoped that one day it would come true. And now it looks like it has.”

Jonathan and Hayley will team up for one night only at the Marina Theatre and tickets are now on sale.

Telephone the box office on 01502 533200

Marina Theatre Not on line yet!

[Martin]

I wonder if this is a one-off or, perhaps, one of several concerts with Hayley?

We will just have to wait to hear from Bedlam.

Martin

[drew]

Martin, do you mean that Hayley and Jonathan didn't tell you about this one at Waterloo? Perhaps they don't know yet.

[Martin]

Oct 31, 2008 14:37:26 GMT drew said:

Martin, do you mean that Hayley and Jonathan didn't tell you about this one at Waterloo? Perhaps they don't know yet.

Yes, Jonathan did mention this one. Anything else is speculation.

Martin

[graemek]

Thanks Drew for the post:

Hayley was first recognised for her talents at just six years old, when she was picked at school to take the lead singing the role of Little Star in her Christmas play.

Her teacher informed her parents she thought the 19-year-old had real talent and by the age of 11 she began busking with friends in her native New Zealand.

Its a good job all of us at HWI know what the journalist meant i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif
Hayley seems able to go backwards & forwards thru time.

Graeme

[martindn]

Hi Greame,

I'm sure her talent is timeless!

Martin

[stuartj]

Oct 31, 2008 20:16:07 GMT graemek said:

Thanks Drew for the post:

Hayley was first recognised for her talents at just six years old, when she was picked at school to take the lead singing the role of Little Star in her Christmas play.

Her teacher informed her parents she thought the 19-year-old had real talent and by the age of 11 she began busking with friends in her native New Zealand.

Its a good job all of us at HWI know what the journalist meant i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif
Hayley seems able to go backwards & forwards thru time.

Graeme

Perhaps I'm as crazy as the journalist, but it took me a long time to see what you meant. I did chuckle when I saw it. Is it gramatically incorrect, or just infelicitous? Perhaps it's not of important to anyone but a professional grammarian. It's a typical journalistic compression, and now I have an image in my head of a 19-year-old Hayley singing amongst a bunch of six-year-old kids.

[Richard]

Look out for the Tardis in Lowestoft!

Richard

[Andrew]

Nov 1, 2008 19:17:51 GMT Richard said:

Look out for the Tardis in Lowestoft!

Richard

'Across The Universe of Time'...

Nov 1, 2008 16:29:47 GMT @roger said:

A few moments later, everyone was on board the Hayleymobile as it seems to be called. It has smoked glass windows but we could just about see inside.

Roger

Hmm... Perhaps they will arrive on a flying carpet instead?

Andrew i.postimg.cc/9fYxy370/smilie-big-grin.gif

[natalie]

Its all sold out

[roger]

This event has been confirmed by Bedlam Management.

I supect this concert is not sold out but that tickets were temporarily withheld from further sales until contracts were fully signed. Keep checking with the venue in the hope that ticket sales resume shortly.

Roger

[gordon]

I have just rung the box office who said this show was not sold out but tickets had been on sale for over a week and only rear stalls and circle were now available.
I assume an article in the local press had prompted the sales.

Gordon(who is most unimpressed)

[Richard]

This concert is now shown on the Marina Theatre's website HERE, but online booking is not yet available.

Richard

[drew]

Eastern Daily Press

Valentine’s spectacular from classic young talent

EMMA LEE

05 February 2009

Jonathan Ansell.
Sometimes the smallest action can be life changing. For singer Jonathan Ansell, it was making a simple phone call. Then a student at the prestigious Guildhall School of Music in London, busking in Covent Garden to try to make ends meet, he saw an advert for a new TV talent show.

The programme in question turned out to be the X Factor, and Jonathan and friends Mike Christie, Matthew Stiff and Ben Thapa, collectively known as G4, came away as runners up.

Their unique take on pop classics, giving tracks such as Creep by Radiohead and Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen a classical twist, was a real hit with viewers. In fact, they went on to greater success than the show's actual winner, Steve Brookstein.

For Jonathan the X Factor was a helping hand to achieving a long-held dream - and he's still a fan of the show.

“I love singing. I love recording. I grew up dreaming of being able to do what I'm doing,” he says.

“I have great memories of the whole X Factor experience and I'm really pleased I saw the advert and phoned up. It's changed our lives. I always get hooked on the series - it's surreal to think that we were once part of that hysteria.”

After releasing a number of successful albums, G4 went their separate ways. Now tenor - and heart-throb - Jonathan is an established solo star with two chart-topping albums of his own under his belt - Tenor at the Movies and Forever, which were both released last year.


Jonathan with G4 back in 2005.
And on Monday, in a coup for the Marina Theatre in Lowestoft, he's teaming up with acclaimed New Zealand soprano Hayley Westenra for a Valentine's-themed night of music.

It's one of just a handful of dates in the country - the only one in the eastern region - and will feature a mixture of romantic classical and pop favourites, such as All I Ask of You from Phantom of the Opera and Time to Say Goodbye.

Jonathan has worked with Hayley on numerous occasions over the last few years - including at an England-New Zealand rugby match where G4 and Hayley were representing their respective countries.

“I love the purity of her voice,” Jonathan says.

“My voice and Hayley's seemed to connect. I was really fortunate that she was available to record a duet for my first album.”

Jonathan has performed before audiences of tens of thousands at events such as Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber's 60th birthday tribute concert and the Rugby League World Cup Final at Wembley.

But his talent was first spotted in an altogether smaller arena.

“I was singing in assembly one day, and I was apparently singing a bit louder than the other kids.

“The teacher spoke to my parents and said I should audition for a choir. I went along and auditioned - I was seven and a half - I was really nervous, but I got in.

“And I was with them for years and years. So I guess I found out I could sing by accident. I found a huge amount of pleasure and release in doing it,” he says.

But at school in West Sussex (he's originally from Bognor Regis), Jonathan suffered at the hands of bullies who picked on him for both singing and the fact that he suffered from acne. He describes himself as a bit of a contradiction - a rebel with an angelic voice.

“Unfortunately people couldn't understand that and I got picked on,” he says.

Another hurdle was his dyslexia, which was only picked up on when he won a place at the Guildhall School of Music when he was 18.

Then came the X Factor audition, and the rest is history. But Jonathan is modest about his achievements.

“Someone called me the Justin Timberlake of classical music, which is surreal. I have to take it with a pinch of salt,” he laughs.

Of course, Jonathan has to take good care of his most valuable asset - that voice.

“I've always lived by the rule that you need to have a certain amount of resilience in your voice, otherwise when you get a cold your voice will give up.

“I'm not one of those people who refuses to travel in air conditioned cars, though,” he says.

While he describes himself as a down to earth sort of guy, who enjoys nothing more than a night down the pub with his friends “chatting rubbish” in his down time, he is a bit of a thrill-seeker too.

As well as regularly braving the London traffic on his bike, he's bombed round the race track at Brands Hatch.

Jonathan's also a keen amateur cook, and last year he took part in a celebrity version of Channel 4's cult cookery show Come Dine With Me, which saw him trying to impress Lynsey De Paul, Tamara Beckwith and MC Harvey with his culinary skills.

Despite his evening not quite going to plan, he managed to finish joint first, winning a share of £1,000 for charity.

“When you have friends round you know who's coming and what they like.

“I hosted the first evening so I didn't even know who was coming until they arrived, so it's hard to pitch the evening. I was so nervous. The camera crew was putting me off, the smoke alarm went off. It was just hysterical. And a real blast,” he says.

Jonathan Ansell and Hayley Westenra's Valentine's Tour calls at the Marina Theatre, Lowestoft, on Monday, February 9. Box office: 0871 424 4444.

[Libby]

Feb 5, 2009 9:46:07 GMT drew said:

"I was really fortunate that she was available to record a duet for my first album.”

Okay, I'm really confused now. It's just been reported that Hayley didn't sing with him on his Forever album, after all. So, what's he talking about? What's his first album, and what did Hayley sing on it?