Marie Osmond coming to Carmel for holiday concert
By STU CLAMPITT
news@readthereporter.com
Unexpected. That’s the title of Marie Osmond’s newest album and is also a good way to summarize the directions The Reporter’s interview with her took.
The only Indiana date for “Marie Osmond: A Symphonic Christmas Tour” will be Dec. 10 at the Palladium, 1 Carter Green, Carmel.
Marie was getting ready for that upcoming Christmas tour when she spoke to The Reporter about the tour itself, the surprising content of her new album, a fair bit about her life, and a little bit about the movie This Is Spinal Tap.
Hey, we warned you right in the first paragraph that Unexpected was an apt title.
“I love Christmas,” Osmond said. “It’s a loaded statement because I think we need Christmas more than ever. I think we need real gifts – I don’t remember what I got in five years, do you? The things that have meant the most to me throughout my life have been the things I did with my children, my family, my friends where you get to go out and be together and talk and lose all the technology.”
Photo illustration provided
She has been associated with what she calls “the great Christmas shows.”
“I started with Andy Williams,” Osmond told The Reporter. “I did Bob Hope’s Christmas shows and his overseas USO tours. I did the Osmond Family Christmas shows and the Donny & Marie Christmas shows. I’ve done really wonderful shows, so I know a little bit about Christmas,” she said with a laugh, “and I’m giving everyone the Marie Osmond Good Housekeeping seal of approval that you will leave there feeling fantastic and ready for the holidays.”
Audiences may hear a little from Unexpected, which was released in December 2021. The album is filled with music from Broadway and opera.
Osmond told The Reporter she has loved this music since she was a little girl, but she never thought she could sing “legit” soprano, let alone opera.
“Every song on here has a meaning to me,” Osmond said. “When I decided to do Broadway, the first show I did was The Sound of Music, and you can’t sing Sound of Music with a country accent. That’s an abomination to Rodgers and Hammerstein. It’s really a thing to learn to sing legit. I worked with James Hammerstein, the son of Oscar, so it was a really great experience. A lady who was one of the nuns in the production said, ‘honey, you can not only sing legit, you can sing opera.’ I said, ‘Shut up!’ And I really spent 25 years preparing myself for this album.”
Having her first single hit No. 1 on the Billboard charts when she was only 13, her whole life has, to a large extent, been lived in the public eye. When asked about that she said, “If I could compare it to something I would.”
Then she told the story about going with her husband, was previously inducted into the Beverly Hills High School Hall of Fame, bringing someone else into it this year.
“I went to this and I’m looking at all these people who have known each other – some of them – since elementary school,” Osmond said. “I’m a big believer in group sports. I think that team feeling, that comradery, teaches a lot of great values and principles and looking out for each other. I looked at it and I kind of got teary-eyed going, ‘Ahh! This is what normal is!’ It was really a lovely thing to see. I don’t really have anything to compare it to.”
On the other hand, she also said that while people think they know a great deal about her, they really do not.
“They know only what I feel is necessary,” Osmond said. “I don’t believe in airing dirty laundry. I believe in sharing things that you feel can help someone else. There are still things in my life that are very private, and I like it that way. Everybody deserves to have a little of that in their life.”
And now, dear readers, we finally get to that This Is Spinal Tap reference from many paragraphs ago.
In November 2019, Osmond ended her residency at the Flamingo Las Vegas after 11 years.
“Did you ever watch the movie This Is Spinal Tap?” Osmond asked The Reporter. “That’s why we went to 11: because it was one more. We were getting ready to end our 10th year and we were taking a bow when I said to Donny, “Let’s go to 11” [British accent] He said, ‘Because it’s one more!’ and that’s why we did it.”
Donny Osmond still performs in Vegas. Marie said he will probably become the next Wayne Newton.
“For me, five nights a week for 11 years is a lot of work,” Osmond said. “I kind of enjoy time with my husband and my children and my grandchildren. I’m co-founder of one of the largest children’s charities, so I get to spend a lot more of my time doing those things now. I love touring, but not every single day. I’m so blessed. I feel like I’m in a wonderful place in my life. I love doing the thing I do. I really love people, so I enjoy doing this over the holidays.”
The charity she mentioned in passing is the Children’s Miracle Network, which she co-founded with John Schneider, Mick Shannon, and Joseph G. Lake in 1983.
When asked if there was anything else she wanted our readers to know about her Dec. 10 show at the Palladium in Carmel, Osmond said, “We will make you laugh. We will make you cry. And you are going to love David Osmond. There is a reason he is in that show, and you will know why when you come and see it.”
Maybe he’s going to take it to 11 too? I guess we will find out on Dec. 10.
Click here to buy tickets for “Marie Osmond: A Symphonic Christmas Tour” online.
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