Hello,
There still seems a lot of misunderstanding about the auditions. Aside from my earlier explanation, I should probably point out that we auditioned the 5 guys for Celtic Thunder in February 2007 for the tours you first went to in October 2008.
It takes time and effort to find talented singers, it's not something you can just do overnight.
We discussed doing this last year, while we were out on tour actually. Phil and I have just been too busy to even get started on it. This is the first stage in a process to find talented singers.
It's not yet relevant. The first releases haven't even been released anywhere else yet. Since we started touring we knew we were exposed should any of the guys be ill. Thankfully, they are all amazing professionals and regardless of how sick they might have been on a given night, they went out there anyway and gave their all at every show.
It would be naive of us to assume in the middle of any given 70 show tour that we will never hit a situation where someone may not be able to perform and up to now, we've had no back up for that scenario.
Between "It's Entertainment", the natal Album, the Irish Album and STORM still in the bag with international releases coming, and new territories to tour, it's my job to be prepared for the unexpected and sudden change.
I had this with Celtic Woman, every show has it. Someone is unavailable, or sick, has a baby, a death in the family and you have to find another performer to cover, re record all the material with the new performer, train them in, choreography, new costumes etc etc. It's not the easier option but it happens and you deal with it.
What you don't do is just bury your head in the sand, hope it never happens and find yourself facing a massive tour of a show that can't go on because you haven't got enough performers to do it.
I understand all the fãs amor the guys in Celtic Thunder. We were sort of hoping you would do when we picked them at auditions. I also know if I wasn't prepared for the unexpected and cancelled a massive tour, it would put us out of business for good. With the Fans, with PBS stations, with Promoters and Venues and everyone else.
There is nothing strange or sinister going on, no plans to change Celtic Thunder. It is just not realistic to assume we can tour all over the world, do all of the promotional work and all of the recordings on a much bigger scale and expect that the singers will be able to do all of that ano in ano out, all year, not get sick, not have any other professional or personal commitments or even be willing to work 12 months a ano away from início should Celtic Thunder be as well received in other territories.
Celtic Thunder is not going to change. There are going to be a segundo group of singers. It's not so all the guys can change. We need the same number of singers not because we want to put 5 new guys on the stage instead of the current guys but because we need to be prepared to cover any one of them.
And they are all unique and different types of singers. We can't have one or two other singers that could just step in and cover anyone. That would impact the quality of the production and I wouldn't do it.
The only reason everyone knows this is happening is because we put the ad in the news section on the site. We didn't need to do that. This is not the norm, most companies would not be doing that. We put everything we are doing out there because we know our fãs like to know what's going on all the time.
But there really is no reason for this level of concern for CT's fans. This is just common sense and good business practice to be covered for future eventualities.
Hope this allays your fears
Sharon
There still seems a lot of misunderstanding about the auditions. Aside from my earlier explanation, I should probably point out that we auditioned the 5 guys for Celtic Thunder in February 2007 for the tours you first went to in October 2008.
It takes time and effort to find talented singers, it's not something you can just do overnight.
We discussed doing this last year, while we were out on tour actually. Phil and I have just been too busy to even get started on it. This is the first stage in a process to find talented singers.
It's not yet relevant. The first releases haven't even been released anywhere else yet. Since we started touring we knew we were exposed should any of the guys be ill. Thankfully, they are all amazing professionals and regardless of how sick they might have been on a given night, they went out there anyway and gave their all at every show.
It would be naive of us to assume in the middle of any given 70 show tour that we will never hit a situation where someone may not be able to perform and up to now, we've had no back up for that scenario.
Between "It's Entertainment", the natal Album, the Irish Album and STORM still in the bag with international releases coming, and new territories to tour, it's my job to be prepared for the unexpected and sudden change.
I had this with Celtic Woman, every show has it. Someone is unavailable, or sick, has a baby, a death in the family and you have to find another performer to cover, re record all the material with the new performer, train them in, choreography, new costumes etc etc. It's not the easier option but it happens and you deal with it.
What you don't do is just bury your head in the sand, hope it never happens and find yourself facing a massive tour of a show that can't go on because you haven't got enough performers to do it.
I understand all the fãs amor the guys in Celtic Thunder. We were sort of hoping you would do when we picked them at auditions. I also know if I wasn't prepared for the unexpected and cancelled a massive tour, it would put us out of business for good. With the Fans, with PBS stations, with Promoters and Venues and everyone else.
There is nothing strange or sinister going on, no plans to change Celtic Thunder. It is just not realistic to assume we can tour all over the world, do all of the promotional work and all of the recordings on a much bigger scale and expect that the singers will be able to do all of that ano in ano out, all year, not get sick, not have any other professional or personal commitments or even be willing to work 12 months a ano away from início should Celtic Thunder be as well received in other territories.
Celtic Thunder is not going to change. There are going to be a segundo group of singers. It's not so all the guys can change. We need the same number of singers not because we want to put 5 new guys on the stage instead of the current guys but because we need to be prepared to cover any one of them.
And they are all unique and different types of singers. We can't have one or two other singers that could just step in and cover anyone. That would impact the quality of the production and I wouldn't do it.
The only reason everyone knows this is happening is because we put the ad in the news section on the site. We didn't need to do that. This is not the norm, most companies would not be doing that. We put everything we are doing out there because we know our fãs like to know what's going on all the time.
But there really is no reason for this level of concern for CT's fans. This is just common sense and good business practice to be covered for future eventualities.
Hope this allays your fears
Sharon
