Friday, April 10, 2015 Follow us on Twitter @Argus_The Guide


ANDYHOWELLS chats to singer/songwriter Albert Hammond ahead of his Riverfront showlater thismonth


ALBERT Hammond has been writ- ing and co-writing hit songs for over forty years, among them The Hollies’ The Air That I Breathe, Leo Sayer’s When I Need You, Whitney Houston’s One Moment In Time and Aswad’s Don’t Turn Around. Albert recently went back in to


Showwill shed light on stories behind the hits


Interview Little Arrows was my first big hit,


the studio to record a new 4 track EP which contains a new song I Guess I Really Had It Coming, and also his most successful song It Never Rains In Southern California, featuring his friend Al Stewart as a duet partner, and Changing Me, a duet song with his son Albert Hammond Jnr. The EP coincides with a date


at Newport Riverfront on April 28 as part of the UK leg of his world tour. Andy Howells recently put questions to the music legend.


What’s the earliest song you can remember writing and what inspired it? The earliest song I can re- member writing is a song called Blue Boy and I wrote it for a girl 14-year-old girl from Scotland whom I fell in love with, I was 15.


One of your earliest song writ- ing successes of which you col- laborated with Mike Hazlewood was Little Arrows which was a hit for Leapy Lee in 1968. What did it feel like when you had your first taste of success?


I met Leapy Lee one night down in Shepherd’s Bush, I went with my aunt to play bingo and Leapy was there, we got to chat and he said he was a singer and knew Gordon Mills, Tom Jones’ manager. So I played him Little Arrows and the next day we went to see Gordon, who loved the song, and made a great record with Leapy. It sold over five million copies, it was a dream come true.


Mike and you were also in the band The Family Dogg; did you find it difficult to get estab- lished as a musician when you were already having major suc- cess as songwriters? The Family Dogg was a group I


formed with Steve Rowland who I knew from years before in Spain. The idea was to form a group like the Fifth Dimension, it was great for the time it lasted and it was a vehicle for Mike and I to write songs for.


Out of all the songs you have written do you have a favourite? Well it’s hard to choose a fa-


vourite, I’ve had so many hits and they’re all favourites’ but to an- swer your question here are two favourites’, One Moment in Time (recorded by Whitney Houston)


3 Music/Theatre


and The Air that I Breathe (re- corded by The Hollies).


Tell us about your latest EP I Guess I Really Had It Coming, what was the inspiration behind that? The EP is something my record


company Hypertension put out to promote the tour, the song I Guess I Really Had It Coming, is a song I wrote in Russia in 1987, but I forget what inspired it.


Your playing some UK shows soon what can fans expect to hear at them and what do you enjoy most about playing live? Anyone that comes to my con-


certs in the UK will enjoy listening to the many hits that I’ve written in the last five decades, the sto- ries behind the songs and the art- ists that I’ve worked with such as Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, Julio Iglesias, Tina Turner etc.


Do you have a favourite song- writer? The one singer songwriter that


I can say inspired me to do what I do is Buddy Holly and one of the reasons he inspired me was his simple melodies, words and chords.


Tickets to see Albert Hammond


are available by calling box office on 01633 656757


Day by day for amateurs in pro hit Musical Theatre


GODSPELL, the legendary rock musical from Stephen Schwartz, returns to Cardiff’s New Theatre next week. Following the critically ac- claimed sell-out success in London’s West End, the show is returning to the UK in a one-of-a-kind


production,


with a new, modern day rock score that features Light of the World, All Good Gifts and Day by Day. The production features


Andy Abraham, Tom Senior and Leanne Jarvis. Supporting the stars as a walking choir will be New- port-based company Centre- Stage Cymru, The last three years have seen this fresh, vi- brant society go from strength to strength, receiving plaudits for productions of, among oth- ers, Whistle Down the Wind and White Christmas, and


HITMAKER: Albert Hammond Watch aspects of love GOING GODSPELL: The stars of Centrestage Cymru


are at present in rehearsals for their next production The Addams Family. Following national auditions


earlier this year the company where chosen to performin the Cardiff dates of the national tour of Godspell, the Broadway Revival. The company were ab- solutely delighted and thrilled


to have been chosen from hun- dreds of groups across the UK. Although only given six


weeks to learn the completely new score, movement from video clips, and rehearsing for The Addams Family at the sametime, thecompanypulled out all the stops to deliver the professional performance that


they have become renown for and are proud to have put the much-talented Newport ama- teur scene on the map in a pro- fessional production. Centrestage Cymru’s Sharon Higgins says the orchestration of Godspell presented at Car- diff’s New Theatre next week “differs from the original giv- ing it a new gutsy rock feel”. “This version was originally performed on Broadway in 2011 then the producers of this production brought it to the West End inMay 2014 for a one- night gala performance. “ Centrestage Cymru are cur- rently hard at work rehearsing the musical The Addams Fami- ly which comes to The Dolman Theatre from April 29 to May 2. Visit dolmantheatre.co.uk for tickets. Godspell in Concert plays at Cardiff’s New Theatre from Friday, April 17-Saturday 18. Visit newtheatrecardiff.co.uk for ticket information.


STC Musical Society will present a Welsh amateur premier of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Aspects Of Love, an amateur production by ar- rangement with ‘The Really Useful Group Limited’, which is being staged between Tues- day 26th May 2015 and Friday


29th May 2015 at the Dolman Theatre, Newport. Tickets are £10. and avail-


able from Peter Hourahine : 01633 841452 / 07854848749 Dol- man Theatre: 01633 263670. Online: www.dolmantheatre. co.uk For more info visit : www.stcmusicalsociety.com


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