Saturday, March 31, 2012
Barry Manilow: 'As soon as the curtain closed I would just fall back into my wheelchair'
The legendary singer admitted in recent performances he would 'fall back’ into the chair when the curtain came down and had to be wheeled to his dressing room.
Manilow said he could only perform because of the adrenalin being on stage gives him - but bravely refused to cancel gigs out of respect for his fans.
The 69-year-old went under the knife in December to repair torn abductor muscles and remove fluid-filled sacs in his hips.
With typical good humour at the time he blamed the need to operate on 'jumping around to Copacabana for 30 years’.
But now as he tries to get back to normal, the 'Could it be magic’ singer revealed that he is recovering 'slowly - too slowly for me’.
Speaking to Rolling Stone magazine Manilow revealed that he only got through six recent shows by pure force of will.
He said: 'As soon as I'd finish, the curtain would close and I'd fall back into a wheelchair and they'd wheel me back into a dressing room.
'I'm not ready to do this yet, but I did it. I got through it and I'm better than I was three weeks ago.
'Everybody thinks I had some sort of a hip replacement; that wasn't it. I had ripped the muscles off my hip on both sides and they had to pull them back and nail them back into my hips.
'So that kind of surgery, which was supposed to take two hours, took seven hours. It was major surgery and it's a long recovery period.’
Manilow added that he had no idea how he got through the performances, but cancelling was not something he even considered.
He said: 'These people (the audience) were out there.'They were so excited, I just had to go through this. They say when the spotlight hits you, you don't feel anything. I always thought that was full of s*** but it's true.’
After spending the last few years doing a residency in Las Vegas, Manilow’s current tour is of more intimate venues and has taken him to places he has not been in some time.
He said that the tour is the 'smallest show I've ever done’ because he wanted to 'shake it up’ a bit.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2120586/Barry-Manilows-painful-recovery-hip-op.html#ixzz1qj8wYdMg
Friday, March 30, 2012
Irma Thomas Earns a Bronze Statue in New Orleans Musical Legends Park
Thomas becomes the seventh musician to be inducted into the park at 311 Bourbon, joining Al Hirt, Pete Fountain, Antoine “Fats” Domino, Ronnie Kole, Louis Prima and Chris Owens.
“I have had a remarkable career and it is an absolute thrill to be joining my friends in New Orleans Musical Legends Park. Awards of this caliber are once in a lifetime and to be able to celebrate it with my friends and family in the place I call home is exhilarating,” Thomas said.
The event will feature a tribute to Thomas from students in musician and educator Damon Batiste’s New Orleans Arts and Education Initiative, the unveiling and a reception.
“Irma is one of America’s most soulful and dynamic singers … she has a place among New Orleans’ — if not the nation’s — greatest musicians,” said Dottie Belletto, executive director of the park. “At a time when Irma continues to be as powerful as ever and forever the cultural ambassador for our city, we celebrate her career as the Soul Queen of New Orleans.”
Thomas, born Irma Lee on Feb. 18, 1941, in Ponchatoula, moved with her family to New Orleans shortly after her birth. She began singing as a teen in a gospel quartet at Home Mission Baptist Church, and made her first recording of a school song at Cosimo Matassa’s famous studio on North Rampart Street. In 1959, band leader Tommy Ridgley was playing at a club where the young singer was waiting tables, and she asked to join his band.
Ridgley helped Thomas get a recording contract, leading to the release of her debut single — Dorothy LeBostrie’s “(You Can Have My Husband, But Please) Don’t Mess With My Man.” Eventually, other hits included “Break-Away,” “It’s Raining” and “Time is on My Side.”
In 2007, her album “After the Rain” won a Grammy Award for best contemporary blues album, her first in a career spanning more than 50 years.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
