It’s Christmas!
Hello everyone and welcome to my December blog! December for me automatically screams one thing… CHRISTMAS!
The last few years I’ve been in pantomime and this year is no exception! Although this year is slightly different as I will be in Vietnam. You can follow my journey via my vlogs on YouTube!!
We will be home before Christmas though which is unusual for pantomime as normally they can go right through into the new year. With so many shows around Christmas time, the Christmas build up feels different as you get to enjoy seeing so many happy faces in the audience but you are normally based away from home so you don’t get that time surrounded by family to go Christmas shopping and have that real build up before the big day in that way.
I spoke to some of my incredible Patreons to find out about their traditions and favourite foods at Christmas so I wanted to share them with you all now. Roslyn opens the smallest present at midnight and always makes sure they start Christmas morning with a visit to church followed by croissants! She remembers fighting over trifle with her sister
Elizabeth makes sure there are green olives available to snack on when she’s watching the football all day on Christmas Day! Nicola saves an Easter egg so that she can eat it on Christmas Eve with her brother Christopher and there are always pigs in blankets around on Christmas Day to snack on Jackie’s go to Christmas snack is marzipan balls.
She remembers when the Christmas cake was made the excess marzipan would be made into balls and that tradition has stuck. Jackie has a lot of self control as she waits until after lunch to open presents!!
Susan likes to eat mini pizzas on Christmas Day and always makes sure she gets her turkey dinner with her mum! Darleens Christmas treat is a dark Christmas cake and remembers the kids stuffed animals, the polar bear and puppy with stockings in their mouth. She also makes a fruit salad on Christmas Eve which is enjoyed by the whole family. Mary makes sure she opens the biggest present first and always has a tangerine, mixed nuts and kids games (like tiddly winks) in her stocking. She enjoys sugared almonds as her treat on Christmas Day.
Gwen remembers the kids opening their stockings but had a rule that no one was allowed to open presents until daylight. Father Christmas would even leave footsteps so the kids knew he’d been! Gwen also has been making christmas pudding as long as she can remember, using her grandmas recipe which is over 100 years old!
Thank you all for sharing your traditions and treats - I love the tradition that my mum has of making personalised crackers which is so lovely as then everyone gets a present specifically for them inside! For me, any chocolate snack is good. I do always associate Christmas with a lindor ball! I remember they have the ones you can put on the tree but they were always eaten before Christmas!!
Wherever you are and whoever you’re with, I hope you all have an amazing Christmas!
The inside scoop on my solo shows…
So this month I’m going to be answering some of the questions I get asked about my solo shows from how I prepare the songs to how I decide what to wear, and more!! Let’s get into it…
Over the years I’ve built up relationships with different venues who all work in different ways, with different tech systems and facilities, payment schedules and performance times so you have to be adaptable and work around them while also making sure the show you’re putting on isn’t jeopardised! I actually reach out to many venues, sometimes with no response which is frustrating but you always want to feel wanted so when a venue does get back to you and seems keen to work together that’s always really lovely!
I try to have 1 LIVE in person gig per month to give those who want to come to everything a chance to be able to do that and also allow space between shows to keep them fresh.
Alongside LIVE in person gigs, I have my monthly zoom concert so again that works quite well as it’s a lot of different songs to learn and I always want to do the best job for each show as every show is completely different.
My solo shows work really well as an intimate venue where there are around 60-80 people as this means I can see everyone in the audience and get to really interact with everyone and hopefully they really feel my emotion when I’m singing songs.
When it comes to picking a theme for a show, I like to keep things quite broad. Unless I’m specifically doing a theme of ‘swing’ or ‘Disney’ then I’ll always try to include a mix. Even when there’s a specific theme I’ll usually find a way to broaden the theme to include other songs. Mainly suggestions from fans but also just songs I enjoy singing! I do really like trying new songs but I have sung so much now that lots of songs do come back around in gigs and I do find that when I repeat a song, it sparks memories for myself and the audience of when I sang that song before and it makes quite a moment. I also find songs that are very well known go down well with audiences as they have their own attachments to those songs and enjoy hearing them LIVE.
I tend to start the set list by writing out all the suggested songs for that gig, plus songs I’ve been singing, plus songs that I feel could be relevant and normally end up with about 30. I then put these in a playlist and listen to them over and over in my car whenever I drive anywhere and sing along to them. This helps me learn the words and also can be a good exercise to work out if some don’t feel right and therefore I can eliminate them from the setlist.
I then find backing tracks for the remaining songs to rehearse to. Sometimes I change the keys here to maximise the potential of the song to allow the high notes to sit in the best place for my range. At this point again, some songs stick out or don’t seem to work as well as others and I can make another cut from the set list. I then practise along with the backing tracks and rearrange the set list if I feel I’ve sung too many ballads back to back and I need to decide on a good opener and closer for each half. Plus I need to think about an encore song (if people ask for more!) So by the time it comes to the show, I’ve probably sung each song more than 20 times!! Even then I still sometimes feel like I could do with just one more practise before the show but that’s the perfectionist in me!!
What to wear?? This is a difficult one as I always want to look and feel good on stage. Collabro always wore suits and that is a really good starting point as I want to look smart, but I also feel sometimes in these intimate venues I like to maybe wear a tshirt under my jacket just to give it that more comfortable element in order to make the audience feel more comfortable too as it’s not a red carpet dinner- maybe it could be!! Haha. I’d love to hear what you all think I should wear or is there a particular look you like me in- let me know!!
I got asked the question of what I would do if I got to soundcheck and a song wasn’t working. That’s actually never happened I think based off the process mentioned above but if it did, I definitely have songs in my wheelhouse that I can pull up to replace anything that wasn’t working.
Now I want to know what your favourite song I’ve ever sung is so please let me know! I genuinely love performing and hope I can continue for many years. I love meeting you all at the VIP meet & greets and also knowing every live show is different keeps it exciting.
Thank you all for your support,
Michael
Collabro’s 10th Anniversary
This is such an exciting blog for me to write as we had a celebration on 7th June 2024, exactly 10 years to the day after winning Britains Got Talent!! (7th June 2014)
So after our Farewell Tour at the end of 2022, it was always in the back of our minds that we’d really like to celebrate the 10 year since winning BGT on the 7th June 2024 but we had no idea it would definitely happen as we wanted to fully embrace individually exploring new pastures although I always had the dream that it would happen.
When we decided as a group to make it happen, Jamie said he could produce it with Lambert Jackson and he’s been absolutely smashing it so we were so excited to be working with them on this!
We really weren’t sure how it would be received by the collaborators but when we saw the response we were so overwhelmed with the support that we knew we just HAD to add a matinee show!!
Once we’d solidified the date it was time to decide the set list. The way we did this was by writing out the top 30 songs voted previously by collaborators and then removed any songs that any member said they didn’t want to do so that all the songs we were going to sing would be songs we were all excited about. Some of the bigger songs that didn’t make the cut but were very close to being in were ‘Come What May’, ‘With You’, ‘Til I Hear You Sing’, ‘Over The Rainbow’ & ‘Empty Chairs At Empty Tables’ - which one would you have chosen to add?? We all agreed that adding The Prayer & One Voice would be so lovely as we’ve not done them as a 4 piece on tour before and wanted you to have songs that aren’t on a CD of ours. Tom asked if he could be the one to rearrange The Prayer as we’ve always sung it as a 5 piece or with a special guest so if you spotted any new vocals then that was Toms allocation!
We then had to create an order of the songs to give a good arc to the show which Matt sorted! We all decided which songs we wanted to introduce so we could plan our speeches and that worked so easily - we are all on eachothers team and know how we work and want the best for eachother so it’s actually very easy.
Next came outfit choice!! We knew we wanted to do the jersey boys medley with the red jackets so we would need to be in black for the second half but because we’ve done 6 tours already, we were trying to think of a new colour to use to open the show with. Because it’s a celebration of the 10years, we talked about previous tours and we said how the Road To The Royal Albert Hall Tour had such iconic blue suits that we wanted to nod to that for the first half of the 10th anniversary show - did anyone think of this link??
As you can already see, we were desperate to add more and more songs so it just made sense that we didn’t have a special guest or choir as that could take away time from our set and we thought you’d want maximum Collabro time, am I right?? In fact, we really wanted the show to be all about us and you… no screens, band or other gimmicks and for us that just felt perfect!
For me, it felt like forever counting down the days to the 7th June. We had rehearsals a few weeks before-hand and I was so shocked at just how normal it was to see the boys in a rehearsal capacity after such a long time and just how after a few minutes of singing, our voices were completely gelled together again!
In fact, at my wedding, we sang O What A Night off the cuff and it was like we’d never stopped singing together which just makes you realise how right we are as a group!!
So the show day eventually came and we all arrived on time BUT Matt had forgotten his black suit trousers so we needed to send someone out to get more! There’s always something isn’t there hahaha. Luckily that was fixable! In fact, having that happen took a bit of pressure off trying to make everything too perfect. We then got to do the meet & greets which were absolutely amazing as it’s so incredible to see all the collaborators from across the globe who have made this whole journey possible!!
Before we knew it, we were walking out on stage for the matinee performance. I don’t remember being nervous, just excited, and the sound from the audience was INSANE! I really remember trying to take everything in, seeing so many recognisable faces looking back at me and just feeling a huge sense of achievement and happiness. The show definitely had its faults but each of them happened so naturally and we worked as a team to recover them.
The thing I always say about a live Collabro show is that no two shows are the same, and that’s because of the little things that go wrong in each one.
Before I knew it the show was over and we were looking out at a full audience giving a standing ovation which was so overwhelming as we hadn’t been in front of an audience of that size for so long.
There was no time to rest though as we had to try and eat some food and get changed before the next meet and greet where we would meet 200 collaborators. I was anxious of time as we want to spend so long with each of you but everyone was very respectful and we had a system in place with Danny With A Camera taking all the photos so not to waste time with personal cameras and phones.
I remember trying to chat with the boys about things we might change for the second show based on the ‘errors’ in the first show but the consensus was that nothing major had gone wrong so just to go out there, be ourselves and enjoy it so that’s exactly what I did! We definitely all had a lot of fun up on that stage.
I remember debating whether to spin Matt around on his stool as I didn’t want to distract from Toms speech but it was just too tempting and as he began to spin and I heard the audience laughing, I knew I’d made the right call!
The show ended with another full standing ovation and rounded off the most perfect day!! All day we were sharing stories of our 10 years together (some that can’t be repeated), and just reminded ourselves of how far we’ve come and how really when it comes down to it, we wouldn’t change a thing!!
Love Michael
The Wedding
Where do I start!?? After proposing on 22/2/22 we began looking into planning the wedding. We spoke to close family about ideas and we actually decided we might look at doing something smaller abroad as we really liked the idea of having sunshine and a very chilled vibe! After a phone call with Cliff, he generously offered that we use his vineyard in Portugal as a wedding venue. We had the plan that we could send out invites and see how many people could come and then go from there with regards to organising a BBQ and enough bubbles haha. Just as we were about to book flights for ourselves, Cliff messaged to say that he had sold his vineyard and it was therefore no longer an option as our wedding venue so we were back to square one!
We had a long think about where would be a nice place to get married and after deciding that it might be easier to stay in the UK, we looked at the Aviator which was where we had our first date of afternoon tea and when we looked around the hotel, we saw huge potential so we decided to run with it!
Because I’m Mr. Organised, I created a budget straight away. I wasn’t 100% sure of how much to allocate to each section but I had a spreadsheet with my sections and tried to do research into getting an idea of what was reasonable to spend on each section. I won’t bore you with all those details but long story short we actually managed to stay pretty much to budget so I put that down to good initial organisation haha. Although it’s tough when you see so many incredible ideas and concepts on Instagram and TikTok etc. with influencers!! I think every week we would see something else we would want to incorporate but actually once we had decided an ideal layout of the day, we pretty much stuck to that!
We obviously had a few issues with the guest list (as I’m sure everyone does as you always want to invite more people than you have spaces) but there weren’t actually any major dramas leading up to the day other than what we were going to wear!! Let’s start with my suit. I had a suit tailor made in Thailand on a family trip in 2023 but it didn’t quite fit with just a month to go so I had to get it re-fitted and then I realised that the material wasn’t stretchy at all so I was worried it would rip with my dance moves so I ended up buying another suit online from ASOS and had that tailored the week before the wedding!!! All very stressful!
And for Nicole’s dress, it all fitted until she put her shoes on and they were higher than she thought so she went to see a tailor who added material to the bottom of the dress but it actually looks like a Vivienne Westwood design so maybe she was ahead of the times!
In the end, there was 2 years, 2 months and 2 weeks from engagement day to the wedding day - all the 2’s
We booked to go to Portugal the week before the wedding so we could have some time to chill, tan and prep! Everyone said we were crazy but this ended us being so useful as we both could really get on top of everything wedding wise and make sure we were as prepped as we could be. Although that did mean when we go home there were a lot of physical things to finish off, from table decorations, putting sweets in jars for the sweet stand, collecting the flowers and even creating the photo table. Now let me explain what I mean by the photo table. Basically I saw an idea where you find pictures of your married guests on their wedding day and put them all on a table and herald all the successful weddings that have come before. It was a really nice way for me to have a picture of my dad up at the wedding without needing to do a big 'in memorial' frame.
Like everything, this took A LOT longer than planned but once it was done I was sooo happy with it and all of the late nights added to the excitement.
We ended up setting everything up the day before in the venue with regards to the aisle, backdrop and sound system which was so lucky as it meant we could chill a bit more on the morning of the wedding. Despite us wanting to stay together the night before we decided to keep it traditional and stay separately. Nicole had a Chinese takeaway with her parents and bridesmaids and then buried a sausage (If you know, you know) before heading over to stay at the aviator. Lots of her close friends had also decided to stay the night before too. She said she had the best time and just felt very lucky to have her nearest and dearest close to her that evening.
I stayed with my mum and sister at our flat and what I thought would be a chilled night turned into a very late evening as I decided to make Nicole a photo book to give to her the morning of the wedding. I had always planned on making a photo book but I didn't want her to find it so I thought I'd have time the night before the wedding but I really didn't - I was still sticking in photos the morning of the wedding! BUT she said she LOVED it so it was all worth it!
The morning of the wedding came and the sun was shining (thanks to the sausage) - we both text each other in the morning round 6.30am unable to sleep as we were ready and raring.
While Nicole was in glam with her bridesmaids, I set up the table decorations, photo table, cake, flowers and made last minute adjustments to the decor and got myself ready. I felt very emotional at times but kept suppressing any urges to cry.
The morning seemed to fly by and before I knew it I was at the end of the aisle waiting for Nicole’s entrance. The moment I saw her all the emotion came out as she just looked absolutely gorgeous. I had imagined what she would look like but she surpassed all my expectations. It felt like time stood still, everything went silent and all I could see was her. It really was a moment I’ll remember for the rest of my life. Tears flowed as well as bubbles and the rest of the day was magical.
We still haven’t received the rest of our professional photos so I’ll catch back in with you another time with unseen exclusive photos and our favourite moments from the day. :D
