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Toronto Star

February 25, 2003

Making the music that feels right

Theatre legend Wilkinson decides to chase his dreams

RICHARD OUZOUNIAN
THEATRE CRITIC

Colm Wilkinson before Roy Thomson Hall Concert.



Yes, there's life after the mega-musical. Just ask Colm Wilkinson.

The former star of Les Miserables and The Phantom Of The Opera may no longer be storming the barricades or bringing down a chandelier, but his love connecting with an audience is as strong as ever.

That's one of the reasons he'll be taking to the stage of Roy Thomson Hall this Friday night for An Intimate Evening With Colm Wilkinson And Friends.

This one-night event will also feature an eclectic group of entertainers ranging from the bagpipes of the Campbell Brothers, the a cappella stylings of The Nylons, and solo vocalists Susan Gilmour and Aaron Wilkinson.

All of it is to benefit charities ranging from The Franciscan Missionary Sisters for Africa, through Toronto's famed Casey House Hospice, to the Celtic Studies Program at the University of St. Michael's College.

Wilkinson has been a long-time advocate of AIDS support organizations, but his work this time out has a personal resonance.

"Sister Elizabeth Murphy works with the Franciscan missionaries in Zimbabwe, and she's my wife Deirdre's aunt," says a cheerful Wilkinson, sitting inside the sun-spattered atrium of Roy Thomson Hall. "She's an extraordinary woman in her 70s who has been working in Africa for over 50 years.

"She travels around the country with video equipment teaching HIV awareness and protection to everyone - children as well as adults. She needs a truck to cart all her equipment around and that's what we're going to raise the money for."

Wilkinson radiates enthusiasm with that unique voice that still - at the age of 58 - sounds like a shot of Bushmills smoothed with a drop of honey.

"I'm singing some of the things that people expect me to, like `The Music Of The Night' and `Bring Him Home,' but the rest of the evening will be songs that I love. Irish music, rock 'n' roll. It's a chance to sit down with the guitar, tell some stories. A very informal evening, a very knees-up kind of thing. Not one of your fancy black-tie affairs."

He laughs wickedly as he lays down the rules. "Dress casual, throw away your shoes. Since the renovation, they have aisles in Roy Thomson Hall now, so feel free to dance in them."

Wilkinson will also be featuring songs from his new CD, Some Of My Best Friends Are Songs, a highly personal collection he released late last year.

"I want to reconnect with my music while I still have the time, the voice, and the energy."
                                                      - Colm Wilkinson

"I dedicated the album to my mum and dad, because I got my music from them. He played the piano and banjo and my mom was always singing. Well, she had 10 children, so I guess she wasn't always singing," he says, eyes twinkling.

One number he felt he had to include was "Red Sails In The Sunset," because "that's what my dad was playing on the piano when he met my mum."

The rest of the selections range from original pieces by Wilkinson through standards such as "Suzanne" and "A Song For You."

"I know this kind of music isn't what people expect from me," he admits, "but it's what I used to do. Good tunes, nicely played by a first-rate band. Some things I like to sing and some things I've always wanted to sing but never quite gotten around to."

Tying up loose ends is something that has been on Wilkinson's mind lately. "I've come to realize that I've only scratched the surface in terms of what this life is all about. I want to reconnect with my music while I still have the time, the voice and the energy."

He realizes now that the years he spent as Jean Valjean and The Phantom were a bit of a detour. "I loved doing Les Miz and Phantom and I'm very grateful for the way they shaped my career. But my first love was always just standing out there with a guitar, just singing different songs, being free, not having to sell the big number night after night.

"Shows like that can do strange things to your head. People think you're the whole show, but you can never forget it's the team of people that work with you that really makes it happen."

Wilkinson chuckles over the fact he came to Toronto in 1989 intending to stay six months and has lived here since.

"I love this city. But like everybody who lives here, I come to take it for granted. It's only when I go away for a while that I really appreciate it."

He grows a bit philosophical, thinking of the past 14 years here. "You know, I came to North America for three things: good work, good money and a good place to raise my family. I found all of them in Toronto."

There are offers for new Broadway musicals, and return engagements of Les Miserables, but it seems like Wilkinson will resist their siren songs.

"Sometimes dreams become things you keep pushing into the future with your fingers and you never actually grasp them. `I'm going to realize that one day,' you say, but you never actually do until it's too late.
"It's time for me to start connecting with those dreams."

Additional articles by Richard Ouzounian

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