I was talking to a friend about a month ago about how my love of the singers & artists that I admire goes much deeper than the work they produce in itself. For when everything comes together in one persona, they shine like a star & their influence on me is profound, life-changing & far reaching. And everybody I know is aware of David Bowie's influence on my life. I've written about him so many times but as today would have been his 72nd birthday, I would like to mention a few things. For instance, he transformed the way I felt & still feel about my own singing voice. When I was singing in north Wales about twenty odd years ago, the bass player who I regularly sang with asked me if I could have some kind of voice operation that would enable me to sing AC/DC/Led Zeppelin type covers. As I was & still am a light baritone who loves crooners & torch singers, I found this an unbelievably crass remark, but then he was a bit of a gobshite in all honesty (& a kopite as well), & although I was able to brush it off (i.e., I told him to fuck off), it also massively increased the swirling insecurities that I had begun to have about my voice at that time. All of the singers in the circle I moved in then were rock singers. I had CF, had been in a West End musical (Les Miserables) & as musicals are not exactly hip in those circles, I was already eyed with a great deal of suspicion. But then, in 2002, I fulfilled an eternal dream when Lydia (ahem - *won* us tickets to see Bowie - oh, the cheeky fox she already was back then!) - & I finally got to see him live. It was literally a life-changing moment. For when I heard his rich, baritone voice, with its vibrato dancing under the stars, I knew in that instant that not being able to screech higher notes than the ones within my range did not make me a less talented singer than the ones who could. Bowie's voice was literally out of this world. It was impassioned, romantic, playful, theatrical, vulnerable,yearning, operatic... & he had an almost identical vocal range to mine. I knew much of this already, of course, but as with so much in life, timing is everything & hearing him live at that crucial period changed the way I viewed myself. And suddenly, my insecurities fell away like an albatross from around my neck. I started using my voice in different ways & I learned that the limitations my CF placed on me could help make my phrasing uniquely mine. And then, as if on cue, I met a brilliant piano player & consequent great friend, Philip Hotchkiss, & within a few months, with him accompanying me on piano, I was singing Jacques Brel & Bertholt Brecht songs, Billy Mackenzie, Rufus Wainwright, Bowie himself, Queen, & so many other great songs with a confidence I would have thought impossible a few years earlier. I was truly in my element & Bowie had had such an important role to play in helping me regain my fragile confidence at that time. I wasn't well enough to sing professionally at this point any more, of course, but singing was still one of the great joys of my life & I will be incredibly indebted to Bowie for, completely unknowingly, helping me in this way.
Another thing that Bowie taught me was how much meaning Romance can bring to your life if you are fortunate enough to meet somebody who has turned & continues to turn your head & heart. Everything I read about his relationship with Iman warmed my soul. In many an interview he stated that the greatest achievement in his life was his marriage to Iman, & that the thing he was most proud of was what he & she had created together as a couple. The pictures I've seen of them show a couple unashamedly in love, sensual, playful, profound, & as uncaring about outside criticism as it is possible to be. He also seems to step back a little in so many of the pictures there are of them together, as if he was intuitively not wanting to steal any of her sparkle or take any of the limelight that was rightfully hers. As if she was his very own Cleopatra, which I'm sure she was. I find this humbling & absolutely glorious. Bowie has certainly helped to teach me how a dandy in love should behave, & to be brave enough for you both to be in love on your own terms & celebrate it whenever & in which ever way you can, is, if these things are important to you, an extremely worthy light to keep in your sights. And as I get older, this message is something I certainly try to keep very close to my heart, as Romance seems to be something of an increasingly endangered species in these conservative days.
And then, of course, there was his magnificent hair & outstanding style, his fearlessness, his individuality, his love of literature & film, his generosity, his love of flirting, his heart breaking performance as Thomas Jerome Newton in 'The Man Who Fell To Earth', his euphoric Lust For Life, & all this combined with the self-understanding & acceptance of his flaws - for never in a million years would he have painted himself as a holier-than-thou type figure. Oh Lordy, as Jason would say, so many reasons why he would become a beacon of hope & glamour & sparkle to an atheist like me that was so desperately in search of pagan heroes, in sleepy north Wales all that time ago.
It's no Little Wonder then I guess that a few years back I decided to adopt him as my dad, as I haven't had the best of luck in that department if the truth be told. And so... Happy Birthday Mr. Starman. Lydia & me will be listening to you today, just as we do on so many others, Day In Day Out.
And as always, Everyone Says "Hi."
Love from your Boy Girl Space Creature. xxx
