An Interview With Paul Child - Official Singer of The Welsh Rugby Union

Paul Child is Wales' biggest independent selling artist. Paul has sang the Welsh National Anthem at many of the Wales international rugby matches at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. ( When Paul sings, Wales wins!). We are extremely proud to welcome Paul to this year's West Coast eisteddfod in L.A. where he will be headlining and leading the singing of the Welsh anthem at the opening concert on Friday Tickets for the performance can be purchased at the bottom of this page.

AmeriCymru: Hi Paul...many thanks for agreeing to be interviewed by AmeriCymru. We last interviewed you two years ago. Care to fill us in on developments over the last few years?

Paul: The last couple of years have been really exciting, with the release of the 'After All These Years' CD in 2009, followed by the 'Best Of...' double CD "My Wales' last Summer. Both CDs have done really well, with the 'My Wales' CD outselling both Cerys Matthews' and Charlotte Church's latest releases. I also performed the Welsh National Anthem for the Welsh football team for the first time last October which was a great honour.

AmeriCymru: You recently performed at Disneyland Paris as part of their annual Festival of Wales, how was that experience and how did it come about?

Paul: Disney in Paris have been holding their Festival of Wales in March for the last couple of years, it's a great 3 day event which sees Minnie Mouse dressed in full Welsh costume for the weekend and lots of Choirs and performers around the park. This year they asked me go go over with my full ten piece band to headline the event. It was a great show with lots of Welsh people who had travelled over for the Welsh weekend as well as a great number of ex-pats living in the area.

AmeriCymru: At Disneyland, you performed "There's a Place," from your "My Wales" album - how was that song chosen and what can you tell us about it's creation?

Paul: Although the 'My Wales' double album is mainly a compilation of the most popular songs from my previous eight albums, we wanted to include a couple brand new songs, just to keep things fresh - Along with "Coming Home To Wales, "There's A Place" is one of my favourites. It was originally written in the Welsh language but we wanted to make it more accessible so it was re-written it in English, it's lovely song. The youtube link below shows a live performance of the track at Cardiff International Arena.

AmeriCymru: You're a father, do your children get to watch you perform? Are they ever able to travel with you? How do they like their dad's performances?

Paul: I'm a very proud father to Michael who is 12 and Kate who is 10. They have been to a few local shows and they like to get involved with the soundcheck and set-up. They are both members of the local youth theatre and Michael particularly loves acting and performing. We have just signed him up to a kids talent agency so we'll see what comes of that!

AmeriCymru: You will be appearing at he West Coast Eisteddfod in September. Is this your first performance in the States? First time in L.A.?

Paul: I am very excited about performing in LA, it will be my first time to do so but I'm lucky enough to have been there a few times in my life - I absolutely love the place! I remember my parents taking me the Disneyland when I was eleven and I made the trip again on my own when I was about 25. In Summer 2009 my wife and I took the kids over, we did Disney, Universal Studios, Seaworld plus of course Hollywood and the beaches. The Strand on Hermosa Beach has to be one of my favourite places in the world - I'd love to retire there one day!

AmeriCymru: Any final message for the readers and members of AmeriCymru?

Paul: Thanks you so much for inviting me to perform at the West Coast Eisteddfod, I am so looking forward to it. I'm sure that it is going to be a fantastic few days that we will all remember for a very long time - see you in September!

2011 West Coast Eisteddfod: Welsh Festival of Arts - Fri 23rd Sept



Opening Ceremonies on Friday, 23rd, 2011 from 6pm to 10pm

in the Barnsdall Gallery Theatre

Admission to Opening Ceremonies/Concert $10

Featuring Performances by:

Paul Child

"Official voice of the WRU"

Michael Aston of Gene Loves Jezebel

Music • Acoustic

Monica Richards/Infrawarrior

Music • Video • Performance Art Installation

Interview by Ceri Shaw Email

An Interview With Paul Child - Official Singer of the Welsh Rugby Union

How does it feel to stand on the pitch of the Millenium Stadium in front of those crowds and be the guy who gets to sing the national anthem?

It is every Welsh singer's dream to perform at The Millennium Stadium, It was certainly mine and I can still remember when I got the call for the first time, it's like one of those moments when you remember where you were when you heard that Elvis had died. I usually do a soundcheck about 2 hours before kick off, before the gates open so the stadium is empty apart from the stewards - it's an amazing feeling, and then to perform and lead the Welsh National Anthem in front of 75,000 Welsh fans is absolutely incredible.

Paul Child at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff, Wales

How did you start singing, what made that happen? What were your goals as a vocalist then?

I started singing at the age of 15, in a school rock band and later on I joined another band who did fairly well locally. We were mainly a covers band, playing Bon Jovi, Van Halen, Whitesnake. I wanted to be Jon Bon Jovi and we were having a great time, playing bars and clubs. Rock singing is, in my opinion, the hardest style to do properly - partly because you are expected to be running around on stage like a lunatic at the same time! This is why I started taking opera and classical singing lessons, learning to breath and project properly when I was 16.

Later, you were a cabaret singer on the Spanish island of Tenerife, how did that come about? How long did you do that and what was it like?

I went on holiday to Tenerife in the early nineties, it was just when karaoke was taking off in a big way and I was offered a job as a karaoke host. It was an ideal job as, early on in the evening, when there were no singers from the audience I had to sing and I used to let the audience pick songs for me to have a go at. I had developed quite a large range by then through my rock singing and classical lessons so I found I could sing just about anything. I would sing Neil Diamond, Elton John, Guns & Roses, Rod Stewart, and my 'party piece' was Meatloaf's 'Paradise By The Dashboard Light' - both the male and female parts! I stayed on the island for four years and while I was there I met fellow Welshman David Alexander - he was hugely popular on Tenerife and sadly he passed away there in February 1995. I returned to Wales a year later in 1996 and when I started singing in the workmen's clubs of Wales, I sang a couple of David's songs.

Now I go back to Tenerife once a year to visit old friends and I always do a show or two while I'm there - it's great because all the Welsh holiday makers pack the venues so it's just like being back in Wales - but its sunny!

You raised the money to self-produce your album, "Wales Forever," as a tribute to Welsh vocalist David Alexander, how did that happen? What inspired you do this album, what was your process in creating it?

When I returned to Wales and started performing on the workingmen's club circuit, I started doing some of the songs that I had heard David doing on Tenerife. I was getting asked by audiences all the time if I had an album available so I decided to go about producing my own. I wanted to do an album of contempory Welsh tunes - songs that have never been huge hits but are part of our folklore in Wales. I approached Johhny Caesar, who wrote the songs 'If I Could See The Rhondda', 'Come Home Rhondda Boy' and 'The Price Of Coal' and we based the album around those three songs. I had already been performing the songs with a male voice choir for some time so we took the choir to the recording studio between Fisguard and Haverfordwest in West Wales and recorded the album in three days.

"Wales Forever" went on to become the biggest-selling independently-released album ever in Wales, selling over 100,000 copies - how did it feel when it started selling that well? Did you know it would do well or was it more of a gamble?

The first pressing of the album was 2,000 copies and it was my intention to just sell them at live shows and small independent local stores but then I started getting calls from UK retail giant WHSmith, asking for two hundred copies per store! We had to move very quickly to supply the demand and, eight years later, that album is still selling all over the world - it's an incredible feeling and with the advent of iTunes and Amazon, more and more people all over the world are downloading it!

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=278809279&s=143444

How did you come to be "the official voice of Welsh rugby"? What does that mean exactly? 2006's "Bread of Heaven" is the official album of the Welsh Rugby Union. Can you tell us some more about that?

Although I was very proud of what we achieved with the 'Wales Forever' album, it was done 'on the cheap'in that the music was produced by sythesisers rather than real instruments so when I was asked to record the Official Album for the Welsh Rugby Team a few years later it seemed a perfect opportunity to revisit some of these songs and record them with a full live orchestra as well as a male voice choir. They had never been recorded in this way before and we felt that the songs deserved the very best production available.

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=251423677&s=143444

Your latest album is "Shine," Can you tell us a little about it? Where can fans see you perform and buy your music?

I have really enjoyed recording 'Shine' - It's very exiting for me because it has a couple of original songs, like the title track and also 'Where The wind Blows'. I have mixed the styles up a little on this album because, going back my early days, I do like to sing in different styles so there are showtunes like 'Bring Him Home' from Les Miserables and even a cover of Journey's 'Faithfully' (one of my all time favourite songs). I've also included a live version of 'One Day / The Answer To Everything'. My live show is something I'm very proud of - we have a live orchestra on stage and the sound they produce is fantastic.

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=280973295&s=143444

I'm looking forward to St Davids Day next year when I will be at The Princess Royal Theatre in Port Talbot - it's a great theatre and we have the Ospreys Choir with us for the first time. My website www.paulchild.com has all the tour details, album details and also a selection of live videos from shows and at The Millennium Stadium.

I have recently been involved in producing singles for the four regional Welsh Rugby Teams. All four singles are being released at the same time with the proceeds going to welsh Charities. Go to http://indiestore.7digital.com/welshmusic/ for full details!

I'm also hoping to be able to perform at the Left Coast Eisteddfod next year so maybe I'll get to meet some of the Americymru members! In the meantime I'd like to take this opportunity wish all of the members a Merry Festive Season and a very Happy New Year.