Month of November , 2007

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WITH £38,000 worth of debt, a burst appendix, a tumour in his abdomen and a broken collar bone, Paul Potts was in danger of becoming the unluckiest man in Britain.

Today, three years after climbing out of a hospital bed, Paul is just back from turning on the Christmas lights in Manhattan.

Fresh from a transatlantic flight and a promotional tour of Canada and America, he is pondering his fortunes, still amazed that he was invited to open the Christmas decorations display in the window of the legendary Bloomingdale's department store.

As recoveries go, this guy makes Lazarus look poorly.

Since winning Britain's Got Talent in the summer his schedule is less like that of a sickly mobile phone salesman and more that of an international rock star.

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Carphone Warehouse salesman Paul Potts won the hearts of the nation when he appeared on Britain's Got Talent.

His rendition of Puccini's Nessun Dorma wowed the audience and judges and led to him taking the crown.

Since then he has stormed to the top of the charts with his debut album One Chance selling over 1 million copies and reaching No1 in 12 countries.

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PAUL Potts, the pint-sized tenor who hid his talent from his colleagues at Carphone Warehouse and had all but given up on singing for a living, has won a huge following since winning Britain's Got Talent.

His album One Chance outsold the rest of the top 10 combined and has topped the charts in 13 countries.

His audition video for the show designed to find a new star to appear at the Royal Variety Performance has been viewed on YouTube tens of millions of times and is now one of the site’s all-time most viewed videos.

Now Britain's Most Talented is on his way to Liverpool for his most nerve-wracking concert to date.

The 36-year-old from Port Talbot in South Wales will sing in front of the Queen at the Royal Variety Performance alongside Bon Jovi, Enrique Iglesias and Katherine Jenkins at the annual charity concert, held this year at the Empire Theatre.  [More]

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TALENT show winner Paul Potts is keeping stum over details of his set at the Royal Variety Performance next week - but admits to having more than a few nerves for the occasion.

The 36-year-old opera singer is refusing to reveal what he will be singing for the Queen but says his fans will not be disappointed.

And despite to singing to tens of thousands of people around the world Paul says he will be pacing the floor before he goes on stage at Liverpool's Empire Theatre next Monday.   Click here for a complete article 

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The amazing story of Paul Potts

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Bill Needham stopped by one day this week.

Bill and I don't know each other very well, but we share one thing -- that I know of -- other than the color of our hair: We both love the opera.

The opera.

Sounds pretentious, doesn't it? I suppose that's because there are some folks who try to make more out of opera than it really is. Just like some visual art. You know the kind I mean. The kind you wash off the kitchen walls when your 2-year-old gets the muse while armed with a red crayon. But if you run a high-class art gallery, you call it art. And you say you are a patron of "the arts."

The arts.  (click here for a complete article)

Paul Potts sending Thanksgiving greeting to the US fans. 

You might want to check Paul Potts official YouTube page periodically for updated videos.  (or stay tuned with PaulPottsFanClub.com)

http://www.youtube.com/user/paulpottstv

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When I left university I didn’t think the world owed me a living. I’d graduated in philosophy, theology, film and television studies. But 1993 was the worst time for graduate employment. I applied for jobs in the civil service, but part of the application was a logic test, and I was never much of a mathematician. So I worked as a verger at Bristol Cathedral for three months, and then at another church for a further three months. Then I found a job at Tesco in Bristol. I’ve always been prepared to roll up my sleeves. But when I was moved on to nights it was like living with permanent jet lag — your body can’t switch off.  More

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LIVE in our studios Friday November 16th. Tune in as Paul Potts will be performing a selection of arias from his debut CD One Chance and sharing his amazing rags-to-riches story with viewers.

Thanks to his victory in the finale of Britain's hottest talent show, Britain's Got Talent, this quiet, unassuming 36-year-old has become the most famous former mobile phone salesman in the country!

The man who once admitted he'd spent most of his life feeling insignificant and anonymous has become one of the most popular 'hits' on the video-sharing website YouTube, with millions upon millions of fans across the globe logging on to lose themselves in the magic of his rich and powerful voice.

"It's slowly starting to sink in now and, although I'm exhausted, I'm loving it!"

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U.K. singer wows Toronto crowd

Winner of British TV show is popular on YouTube

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Paul Potts, a 36-year-old cellphone salesman-turned-operatic star, made a surprise appearance in downtown Toronto today.

In his only public performance in Canada, Potts stopped people in the financial district in their tracks with five songs and an encore.

He stayed to sign CDs for three hours.

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Paul Potts To Open Bloomingdale's Holiday Windows Monday November 19th
 
Special Musical Performance By Britain's Got Talent Winner and Oprah Favorite Potts

Hosted By Lance Bass, Author of 'Out Of Sync,' Currently Starring in Hairspray

Windows Inspired By Children's Creations From The Children's Musuem Of Manhattan and The Children's Museum Of The Arts
 

WHAT: The unveiling of Bloomingdale's annual holiday windows, a New York holiday tradition

WHO: Singer Paul Potts, performing songs from his debut Columbia album 'One Chance', with Host Lance Bass, author of Out of Sync, currently starring in Hairspray

WHEN: Monday, November 19th, 4:30 pm

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Paul Potts Biography from Billboard.com
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Paul Potts was exactly what the producers of Britain's Got Talent were looking for when they finally launched the program in the U.K. after much delay, an ordinary bloke, working in an ordinary job, but with an extra-ordinary talent. Simon Cowell's latest project after half a decade of involvement with TV talent shows aimed primarily for singers, was a national contest with a public vote for all types of talents, singers, dancers, magicians, ventriloquists and even more extreme novelty acts. After an aborted start when the show's chosen host, Paul O Grady defected to Channel Four television and refused to front the show for ITV, their flagship presenters Ant & Dec were brought in and the program finally got underway in June 2007.

Two tales of joy, caught in a Net

Article from The Kansas City Star

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For everyone alive there comes that occasional day when the heart’s sky is clouded and some kind of lift — a bit of inspiration — is sorely needed.

I’m not immune to that universal affliction, though I’m glad to say I’ve found a dependable remedy. Two remedies in fact, both of them stored safely away in this hateful machine — a computer — upon which a worse disease, called progress, obliges me to write.

At the touch of a couple of buttons, those two cures for ennui or desperation can be called into immediate service.

Probably you know about them already. If not, you might well give them a look. MORE

Paul Potts Article

Paul Potts Wins Over YouTube
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It's hard to believe that the unassuming, soft-spoken man on the phone is responsible for over 15 million hits on YouTube. Because it's just not true -- he's since crossed the 30 million mark.

The Bristol native is neither Chris Crocker, the Britney Spears fanatic who screamed his way on YouTube to a TV offer, nor Miss South Carolina who coined the term "U.S. Americans" in her nationally televised geographical fumbling a few months ago. Instead Potts brought tears to the audience of Britain's Got Talent for his rendition of "Nessun Dorma," which he'll also sing on Oprah's YouTube Special. Potts is now known as the former cell phone salesman that could -- and who had plenty to say about his debut album One Chance, opera, and meeting his hero Pavarotti.

Questions & Answers follows Click here for complete article

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ThisIsMoney.co.uk

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His first album, One Chance, went to No. 1 in Britain and 11 other countries. He and his wife Julie-Ann, 27, live in Port Talbot, Wales. He talks to Liz Phillips about his money.

HOW MUCH WAS IN YOUR FIRST WAGE PACKET?

I was a paper boy when I was 12, a year before I was legally allowed to work. I earned £2.50 a week. After university, I worked at Waitrose, starting as a shelf-stacker on £1.62 an hour.  (More)

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I saw Paul Potts on Oprah Winfrey show today.
It was nice to see Paul Potts performing on the show. 
It was also nice to see the after show clip. It was actually very good.

But, as a fan, I would have rather not seen Paul Potts like that.

I didn't like the over-all topic of today's show.
Today's Oprah show was all about normal folks enjoying 15 minutes of fame from YouTube. 

Paul Potts was among a lot of normal folks who got discovered by doing something comical and outrageous.  One of the guests was a dog who can skate-board.  There was a guy who became popular for doing a silly dance.

I didn't like how Oprah bunched up Paul Potts with low-class circus acts.

Paul Potts should have refused to be on that episode of Oprah.
To me, this was the low point of Paul Potts career.
At this rate, the whole world may consider Paul Potts as an "Internet singing guy".

I've seen pictures of Paul Potts arriving at various airports.
Paul Potts always pushes his own cart, and he puts luggages in the trunk of the car. I don't think Pavarotti ever carried his own luggages when he traveled.

I hope Paul Potts' next album will do even better so the industry will not low-ball Paul Potts like that. 

I am not happy about today's Oprah show. 
It was insulting.

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They are getting ready for the Royal Variety Show in Britain.
Perfomer line-up is announced.

www.itv.com/Entertainment/chatandtalent/RoyalVarietyPerformance/default.html

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A FEW days ago a friend sent me an email with a video clip attached. “You must see this, very inspiring,” she wrote.

It was a clip from a talent search show called Britain’s Got Talent (BGT), a British version of the hugely popular American Idol. My first thought was “right, it is like one of the worst moments on American Idol thing” and was prepared to settle down for a laugh.

Then there appeared one Paul Potts, a gap tooth phone salesman, who professed to be totally lacking in confidence but loved singing. When he was asked by the judges as to why he was there at the audition. I always thought that was a silly question. Why else should someone appear on the stage before three demanding music judges, if not to sing?  (More)

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A few months ago, he was a mobile phone salesman in a small town in Wales.

Before that, he stacked shelves in a supermarket.

He was bullied as a schoolkid, laid low by a devastating bicycle accident in 2003, and ended up so broke he and his wife were using credit cards to buy food.

Today, thanks to the Internet and a red-hot CD, Paul Potts is one of the most famous names in music and on Tuesday, he'll become even more celebrated, courtesy of his debut appearance on the "Oprah Winfrey Show."

For the unassuming 36-year-old Englishman, the wealth, the fame, the best-selling CD, the millions of hits on YouTube and the autograph-seeking fans are a dream come true -- and it's happened so quickly he's still trying take it all in.  (MORE)

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Arts organizations are always talking about how to cultivate new audiences. A tried-and-true one has been the Theory of Exposure: Get the art in front of people, especially youngsters, and they will acquire a taste for the art.

That kind of thinking has been around at least since The Muppet Show first aired in the late 1970s. Opera advocates rejoiced when Beverly Sills starred on the variety show. They predicted a new generation of opera lovers (and, more importantly, opera patrons) who would be inspired by Sills’ powerful performance and magnetic personality.

The same went for the other art forms: jazz (when Dizzy Gillespie and Lena Horne were each guests), musical theater (Liza Minnelli, Zero Mostel), ballet (Rudolf Nureyev), and classical music (Liberace).

Well, maybe not Liberace (too many sequins, too much lowbrow appeal, some might say), but you get the point.

Anyway, for those concerned about high art’s losing cultural authority to the increasing dominance of popular entertainment, the thinking was: If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.

Now comes Paul Potts.

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