Hi everyone,
Happy Thursday.
Hope you've all had a good week. It's been nice weather eh?!
So it has been a very eventful week for me. My single was released on Monday and it hit number 5 in the itunes world music charts! I am absolutely delighted and can't thank you enough if you bought it. The reaction from you all has been amazing and it has filled me with reassurance that it's all been worth it - Having had so much time passed since we agreed to do an album (last September) I have made every creative decision myself from themes to song choices, and all the text for the sleeve and choosing the photographer and the final pictures etc, so when the time finally came for it to go public, i think it's only natural that i started to wonder, my god what if no one likes it?! Ha. But I am very proud of it and am so delighted that so many of you say you keep playing both tracks over and over. Sh-boom!
So last Thursday….. my goodness what did I do. I seriously cannot remember. Ah yes that's right, I worked solid on the summer school all morning before heading out to buy lots of sheet music for the showcase. I also picked up a guitar song book with 20 songs in it that only use the same four chords so I was excited to get back to the theatre to see if I could play them, so after meeting my friend Haley for a quick hello and catch up and then dropping off an opening night card to the Trafalgar Studios for my good friend Ashleigh (who has duetted with me on my album) as she opened in a musical comedy entitled 'Betwixed' - GO SEE IT!!!, I then headed back to the theatre, picked up my guitar and strummed out the best rendition of Dolly Parton's 'Jolene' that I possible could (with a good few pauses for my fingers to find the right strings). Then I did the show.
On friday I yet again, worked hard on my summer school stuff all morning before meeting a great friend of mine Edwin and his best friend Jo as I needed to pick something up off them and it was lovely to catch up. Then I went to the Novello Theatre to see my friend Hollie Taylor who's currently performing in Betty Blue Eyes. I interviewed her for our new West End In Wales website which is launched on Monday, and then we had a good old catch up putting the world to right. I adore her - what a lovely friend!
During the interval of Wicked i also interviewed Sean Parkins who is our Dance Captain and Swing, which will also be hosted on the new look westendinwales.com site soon!
After the show on Friday I headed home to properly work out my busy weekend in my head.
I woke Saturday morning to do even more work on the summer school before heading in for the matinee. In between shows I was busy editing a very special video for all the lucky students signed up for my summer school - which starts ON MONDAY!!!
Then did the evening show before heading home to use my flatmate's styling advice to help me decide what to wear for the Festival on Monday. It all started by me saying "Fish…(that's what we call each other….long story) what does one wear to a launch for their debut single?" He laughed at me and then I put on a little fashion show and decided to just go with a smart casual look which you'll see in this weeks video blog!
After pulling out most of my wardrobe to create potential launch outfits I then had to tidy up, pack my bags and get to sleep as I had an early start to get back to Wales on Sunday morning.
Sunday morning i woke at 7am and headed home to North Wales, well actually only went as far as Chester where my friend Aimee picked me up and we went shopping for props and costumes for the summer school before heading home for me to see my family (especially my amazing nieces) and had some tea.
In the early evening I needed to have a meeting with someone very talented in the local area in North Wales who you'll be seeing more of in the future (I'm saying no more) to discuss a few business things. It was a very lovely evening.
Aimee and I then went back to my folks place (The Ranch) for me to rehearse my songs for the launch and for us to do some work on the summer school. We were working on it whilst watching the T.V tribute to Amy Winehouse - It's absolutely devastating isn't it?! What a dreadful shame. Ridiculously talented and what a troubled life which ended too early.
We then waited until just gone midnight to check out my single on itunes and amazon. It was a great moment. Seeing my first single available to buy! Then immediately once midnight struck my twitter account went wild with people saying they were downloading the two tracks and listening to them and enjoying them and retweeting the links etc - I am so lucky to have such supportive fans!!! Thank you so much.
So Monday's launch you can check out on my VLOG:
http://vimeo.com/27270618 (Copy & paste it into your search bar)
Immediately after I stepped off stage I said farewell to my family and was then ushered into a taxi to the train satiation at 2.30pm to get back to London in time to do the evening performance at WICKED. I was tired to say the least! Great day though! On the train journey back I took the time to answer a very well researched interview for London Theatre. They'd really done their homework - asking very thorough questions and it was a pleasure to answer to someone who'd invested such effort into the interview. Here is the link to the interview if you want to have a read.
http://www.lastminutetheatretickets.com/blog/index.php/6811/interview-with-mark-evans-fiyero-in-wicked-the-musical/
While i was in Wales I was doing some promotion for the GWYL GOBAITH (Festival Of Hope) which is an English & Welsh language open air music festival which I've mentioned a couple of times which I'll be doing on August 28th. Get your tickets. It's a wonderful night and a great atmosphere. Everyone sits around with their picnic tables and chairs set up and picnic blankets and takes over this giant land. A few thousand people attend so don't miss out! I can't wait!
After the show I went home and my brother was there with his girlfriend waiting for me as I'd given him my spare set of keys to let himself in. They just came down for a couple of days to enjoy London!
I spent Tuesday morning doing a lot more West End In Wales work before meeting the acting coach of the course, Gareth Aled who's been regularly working as an actor at The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden this year. It was a great meeting, he inspires me let alone the students of the course! We are on the same wave length as far as educating students is concerned which is why he's the perfect staff member for my course.
Afterwards I shopped for more sheet music and other things I needed before meeting my personal trainer at the gym who worked me so hard that it even hurts my man boobs to type this now - two days later! It was a great session and good to get me focused!
Then I had a meeting with the musical director of the summer school to brief her on what she's doing next week before heading to warm up and doing the show. My brother and his girlfriend were watching so we grabbed a quick drink after. They loved the show.
I yesterday morning (Wednesday) and yet again worked on more summer school stuff as I had to meet my choreographer Drew between the shows and needed to give him all the info he needed. So I worked on that, then bid farewell to my Brother and his 'Mrs' before heading into do the matinee. Drew Mconie who is the choreographer for West End In Wales was on the BBC show 'So You Think You Can Dance' last year, and he was incredible on it. Get on YouTube and check him out. His choreography work is impeccable and he is tipped as one of the best up and coming choreographers and I'm so proud and delighted to have him choreographing for the summer school this year. The students are in for a treat.
I went back to stage door after meeting Drew for some food and was given a few gifts which had been left for me after the matinee. I have tweeted a picture of the collage of me that was given to me, it was incredible and very thoughtful. I also had a letter from a lovely 10 year old girl, who had bought me some sweets (percy piglets) with her own pocket money! That is probably one of the sweetest things that has ever happened to me. I consider myself a very generous and thoughtful person and therefore really appreciate it when I experience generosity or thoughtfulness and kindness in return - especially from a 10 year old!
It made my evening!
Headed home after the show last night because there were some major issues one of my West End In Wales assistants had been having with internet and emailing etc - just what you need after a two show day, so I headed home to sort it out and work on it until early hours of the morning.
Which brings me to right here, right now, Thursday Morning and still working on summer school stuff! I adore the summer school and it is one of the most enjoyable and rewarding weeks of my year, but it's also one of the hardest weeks work wise and nobody understands the amount of preparation that has to go into it to get it running to the standard I insist on keeping up and improving on year to year.
I have a holiday in September - I will definitely need it!
I want to thank you all again for reading this, buying my single and generally being marvellous! Your support is amazing! Keep tweeting and messaging cos I read all of them!!!
Keep smiling and love your lives!
SH-BOOM!!!
Mark
