Tony Mantor's : Almost Live..... Nashville - Russell Watson & Helen Jane Long:A Collaborative Journey of Two Musical Powerhouses

Episode Date: April 30, 2025

Russell Watson and Helen Jane Long share the story behind their new collaborative album "Shine," blending Watson's powerful tenor with Long's evocative compositions to create music that uplifts and inspires audiences. • Multi-platinum tenor Russell Watson and billion-stream pianist Helen Jane Long met after Helen had admired Russell's voice for over 20 years • Helen specifically wrote the entire album for Russell's voice—a first in his 25-year career • Recording at Abbey Road Studios with world-class musicians created a magical atmosphere for their collaboration • The project combines Russell's soaring vocals with Helen's signature piano and string arrangements • Their creative process valued spontaneity and "feel" over rigid adherence to written music • Both artists emphasize the importance of creating albums as complete journeys rather than collections of singles • Russell is celebrating his 25th anniversary as a recording artist with a major UK tour • The pair share a passion for authentic music played by real musicians with real instruments • Their playful banter and friendship creates a natural chemistry that enhances their musical partnership • Both believe music is "the single most largest catalyzer for memories" in human experience   Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

My career in the entertainment industry has enabled me to work with a diverse range of talent. Through my years of experience, I've recognized two essential aspects. Industry professionals, whether famous stars, or behind-the-scenes staff, have fascinating stories to tell. Secondly, audiences are eager to listen to these stories, which offer a glimpse into their lives and the evolution of their life stories. This podcast aims to share these narratives, providing... information on how they evolved into their chosen career. We will delve into their journey to stardom, discuss their struggles and successes, and hear from people who help them achieve their goals. Get ready for intriguing behind-the-scenes stories and insights into the fascinating world

of entertainment. Hi, I'm Tony Mantor. Welcome to Almost Live Nashville. Joining me today are two musical powerhouses, Russell Watson and Helen Jane Long. Russell, a multi-platinum, multi-million selling British tenor, made history with his debut album The Voice, which topped charts in the U.S. and UK for an unprecedented 52 weeks, followed by his second album holding number one for 36 weeks, a record yet to be matched. Helen, the world's highest streaming female pianist, has captivated audiences with nine albums, selling over 3.5 million copies and amassing more than one billion streams. Together, they've crafted Shine, a stunning collaborative album that fuses Watson's soaring vocals with long's evocative compositions,

showcasing their shared passion for music that uplifts and inspires. Thank you both for being here today. It's a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you for having us. You both have created this incredible duet. Can you tell us the story behind it, how you came to collaborate on it, and what inspired you to work on this? Well, go on, Helen, you tell him. So, in about 2001, there was a program on the TV, a series called Star Trek Enterprise.

Yes. I waited till the end of the credits because the singer on it was fantastic. Find out it was Russell Watson. Fast forward then about 24 years. And I was with my audio engineer in a recording studio talking about a song I'd written and the voice that I still would love to record is. is that voice. And he said, oh, I'm actually going to see Russell this weekend.

We're working together. So my audio engineer then approached Russell and mention my name. And Ross said no. No, he said yes. I think originally I did say no, but I thought we weren't going to mention that. Oh, sorry, sorry.

Silly you. Silly me. Once the concept was discussed, how did it evolve from there? Well, we had initially I'd written a Christmas song. So we started off by Russell, like the song I'd written, so we recorded the Christmas song. And then it kind of progressed from there, really.

We started, we carried on chatting, hit it off, had a very similar sense of humour. And then we just started getting together and trying different songs. And it's been the first time I'm correcting all the years Russell's ever been in the music industry that somebody's written an album specifically for him. It wasn't songs that I just had and then said, sing these. We did them together based on his life, his voice. I was very particular about the way his voice sounded and all the sort of sonic registers

and to be sympathetic to that and then the way, obviously, I do my strings and piano and choir, just making sure that everybody is a well-supported musical experience. I think he liked it. Did you like it, Russell? No, Helen, I didn't like it.

I loved it. I really like the banter between the two of you. It just creates a laid, back just a great feel about everything. I mentioned to Helen before an old story about the word like and good and things like that. And it was an old story that I heard from a chap called Danny O'Donovan, who used to tour manage Frank Sinatra. And he was with Sinatra this particular day.

And supposedly Sinatra had invited a... couple of people to come to see the show and afterwards they came over and Frank said, what do you think of the show? And this guy looked at him and said, yeah, it was good. And Frank, as cool as anything, turn around to him and said good, closed

last Tuesday. Yeah, I thought it was a great anecdote from a man who after watching his show, you probably wouldn't say it was good. No, or nice. It was all right. You worked bad.

I mean, I thought Tony Bennett was better last week. Yeah. I love that. Great story. So when did you both start working on the project? It was after Christmas, wasn't it? Yeah. It was kind of did track and then kind of started chatting again in December and January time.

And then sort of started thinking about ideas then and just kind of getting together really and seeing how it works. Because I'd never collaborated with anybody. before I'd always worked to my own for my music career. So it was a nice change for me. And we just started developing ideas. I've always kind of, you know, I've always been surrounded by, you know, particularly from around the first album and forwards.

I've always been surrounded by a team of people. You know, lots of people around all the time, studio and on tour, always surrounded by people. So, you know, it was interesting trying to get hell of, and out of her sort of anti-social shell and trying to bring the best out of her because when we first met, she was really quite shy and retiring

and a little bit nervy, weren't you, Helen? I was. I used to beat at Russell's house and the only thing to make me feel better was to bring my sourdough bread, so I'd make bread. That's a great little bonus right there. Yeah, didn't we? We'd have bread for lunch, a bit sourdough. So with the collaboration that, I mean, like you said,

you've done a lot of things and you have a team around you, and you both have a team, to speak, You both have careers this done so well. So what were the emotions you felt when you heard that very first note in the studio on this project that you had high hopes for? It's always a great feeling as a singer when you've been working on a project for a period of time. And you've been listening to demos and kind of going through the stuff where you're trying to initially, I think, envisage how is this going to sound? You know, and no amount of talking is going to create what, in essence, will be the end product of the sound.

So when it actually got to the point of being in the studio, I'm recorded at, you know, the famous, world famous Abbey Road Studios. As soon as you walk in through the front road of Abbey Road Studios, you've got the wall of fame, you've got the beaicles looking at, you've got the Rolling Stones, you've got, you've got Bowie, you've got some of the biggest named artists in the world all down the wall. of this amazing place that just has history oozing from the woodwork. So when you get in there, you don't really need much inspiration. But the music lifted me to a different level. Helen had done such a good job that the choral sections are just phenomenal. The instrumentation, the orchestration, again, just lifted the music for me from, I mean, originally I thought this is great, but when we got to the point of, you know, actually

recording, that was really where you feel or I certainly felt inspired. Yeah, I totally get that. There's nothing like being in the studio with the players seamlessly integrating their contributions and then through this dynamic collaboration, the project just opens up and has such a great life to it. Some of the soloists, the overdubs that we've got in there, are just tremendous. Both Helen and I are blessed to work with a group of fantastic musicians. And they're all really nice people. That's what I said to Ross was that I'm quite passionate in this industry or any job, really,

to be able to choose and just work with nice people. Yeah. You don't have to, sometimes you're stuck and you don't have a choice, but we do have that choice. And for me, I'm as passionate about the kindness and the people as they are as I am with the creative process. The beauty of a project of this caliber is everyone knows their role. No chips on their shoulder, no egos.

They can collaborate so easily, bouncing off one another and crafting sounds that perfectly resonates with everyone that is working on this project. And that's how you get that studio magic. Yeah, very much. When you're working with musicians of the year, we've been working. Yeah, no, it's been great. You get in there, you're showing the music. I think one of the main things, I mean, it's all well and good reading.

the dots off the page, but you've got to be a vibe merchant as well. You've got to put the feel behind it. Feel is something that you can't teach at music school. Feel is something that you can't explain. And you either have it or you don't. I mean, even with the gospel choir, I went in sort of knowing what I was going to do with them and they literally started singing and I went, we're not going to use that paper then because just them opening their mouths and singing changed how I wanted to adjust them against

Russell. So I just changed it on the day and I'm kind of known for going around with either a printer because I will change what I want to do on the day because to you hear Russell sing or until you hear the strings or until you hear the choir, you can't be sure that's what you're going to end up with. You know, you have an idea, but I think you have to have some flexibility and they might do something accidentally and you go, can you do that again? And then that becomes part of the piece. Oh, absolutely. I was producing a singer here a few years ago. everything was going perfect right to the chart. Yeah.

Then one of the strangest things that ever happened to me, one of the musicians was playing along and he made a mistake and everyone followed him in the mistake. Yeah. Then they all said, oh, we have to change this. I said, oh, no, no, no, that has got such tremendous feel. Yeah. Which we built from it and it turned out great.

So you made a great point there. Yeah. Yeah. And with me, I make mistakes all over the place. So, you know, Helen was just loving it, weren't you? Oh, it was. The inspiration was just blowing. Oh, it's not so.

No, right. And you want everyone to be able to have their opinion. You don't want to go in anywhere and say, this is the way it's going to be sung. How am I to tell Russell how to sing? He knows his voice better than anyone. So I might be able to say, well, I want, let's try this or let's try that. But, you know, he's very good at pushing his voice too.

And you should allow people to be able to do their thing, as much as I do my voice. my strings and my arrangements. That's why it works nicely together. Absolutely. It's the ability to let someone improvise a little bit that can help the situation out. Yeah. If they play it note for note as it's written and you don't allow that creative process to happen every now and then, you just never know in the process what you could lose. It's the quickest way to kill something, I think. Absolutely. So true. So what's the plans from here? What's the future hold for the both of you?

I think the plans are just to sit back and relax, do the, do the interviews and do the chats and the TVs and wait and see what happens. The music is, it just feels like the music's so strong, the lyrical content so strong that I feel like the cream will rise to the top. So yeah, we just, we sit, we wait. Helen's done a lot of stuff in with, with regards to the top. She's worked on a lot of TV commercials. She's done big movies.

She works on the Lord of the Rings trilogy. She's composed for the Mercedes-Benz F-1 team. So she's got this long list of triumphs. And, you know, at some point, it's one of those things where you don't know what could catalyze out of this. Maybe a film theme tune or something like that. Because they're the type of things that can really kind of lift the music off the page. you know, we sit, we wait, we hope.

And I feel like good things are going to come from this music and this record. And I think there'll be people noticing and taking note. Absolutely. And we've got, you know, we did with the single Shine. We had an animation. We've had just a sort of sneaky preview of the new animation we've done for the next single Unrememberer and the full version comes out and made. But it's been just as fun creating a video because I think it used to be such a big deal. Somebody released a song.

for that video, that other story along with the tune. And I really missed that. So it's been really good fun bringing that back to life, coming up with a concept, coming up with an idea, coming up with an animation and having fun with it. Yeah, there's nothing better than having an idea, thinking about it a little bit, putting the pieces of the puzzle together. And then once you start, you let the creative process happen so that you can listen to it. Tweak it wherever it needs to be tweet with the outcome of just a great piece of work. Yeah. That's what we're doing.

Nice. Yeah. And that's, I think, yeah, I think these days, it's very, it's very seldom. I think because of the nature of the industry and how it's changed over the years, I think there's, things just don't seem to come out of the box as quick. Things build, they catalyze, and they grow. And if things do come out of the box, really quick. Generally, it's

quite transient, doesn't last very long. Music's to be enjoyed. It's to be savored, I think, we've changed the direction for good and bad with digital providers and having things up, up really quickly, that we should savor an album. This album was written as an album. You come into it, the

placement of the songs within it are thought out, so it lifts you in and it brings you out. It's not just a bang, chuck them all on. And just having that enjoyment, listening it from the first track to the last as a story. And so? Yeah, that was one great thing about albums and CDs. You could record the music, sit back and listen to it, knowing that you created a story within a story. Yeah. With that, you could go through

one, two, three, all the way up through to 10 or 12, whatever the number was on the CD or album, and the story was there to be told within the song structure. Yeah. Unfortunately now, because of the digital age, all that seems to be lost. It's funny because we were talking about that in an interview earlier. And I said, I missed those days of that sense of, it was an event when you were, I remember as a kid, you know, as a teenager, I'd jump on the number 10 bus into Manchester City Center. We'd walk up Market Street, me and my friends. We'd queue up in the HMV there.

And we'd wait for the record. We'd get a record, we'd take it out, we'd open the sleeve, we'd get on the bus back home, we'd be reading the track listing, then you'd get home, you'd run up the stairs to your house and pop it on the disc player, put the needle to the plastic, and there it was the album. And there would be no skipping tracks. There would be no skipping tracks. And the great thing about that way of listening to music is that, again, back in the day, there might have been, say I listen to track one and two,

I really like those. Track three, not so keen. And occasionally I might just skip over that to the next one. But then you'd find over time, you'd go back to track three. Ooh, actually, I quite like that. There were tracks on there that what you would call growers, tracks that would grow on you over. That doesn't happen now.

You listen to a piece of music. There's a track you don't like. Probably never going to listen to it again because you're so used to flicking back. certain tracks. And you can, you know, you set up your little playlist as well. And it's quite sad because I don't genuinely don't think now we get the essence of what an album actually represents as a body of work. Yes, I totally agree with you. Plus, having the analog part of it, that needle on that vinyl, that needle on the vinyl had such a different feel to it as well. I think that's

the reason why vinyl is starting to come back a little bit with the sound of a needle on vinyl. you can't duplicate that feel. And it sounds different. It does. You know, I always have been doing the same with the album we've done together. It will be on vinyl. But it sounds different.

You know, you sit in a room and it is with you in that room. You cannot get away from the fact it is such a beautiful sound. Yeah, the only way I can describe it is like a warm cup of cocoa on a cold winter's day. It has a warmth to it and a depth to it

that definitely the over-compression of digital does not give you. No. Yeah, I've had those conversations with friends of mine. They've got all these new fancy plug-ins. And all they are is duplicating the original analog feel that we always had. So I tell them, why duplicate? Just use the original one.

True. Yeah, exactly. Can't beat live. You know, that's another thing. We'll be bringing this to live, literally live as well. And you can't beat that. I think whatever you do recording-wise, to see an artist on stage like Russell with his voice,

doing his thing is a wonder to behold Russell Watson. I shall pay you later, Helen. Thank you so much. My pleasure. That was my next question. Are you planning on getting out there to do some live performances around the world? Well, I'm definitely touring this year. The end of this year marks 25 years as a recording artist. And I am coaxing Helen in terms.

joining me on stage for a few of my performances. So, you know, it's one of those. Wait and see, I think. Hopefully, it's going to join me at some of the bigger venues I'm going to be doing. Yeah. That'd be great. Very nice. I think that would be great because you both have a tremendous amount of fans.

And, of course, they love to see you do your own thing. So if you were to do some shows, I think the energy would be very high for them to come out and see you do your new material. material. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's going to be good.

It's going to be a good year this year. A lot of exciting things starting to catalyze and yeah, onwards and upwards. Absolutely. Well, that's really good. I think what you're doing is very refreshing. It's sparking fresh ideas and enthusiasm. And I think people will be thrilled with the new material that you're bringing to the table. We hope so.

And that's the thing is it's not. new, it's fresh and it's real. It's real. It's not computerized music. It's real music played by real people with real instruments. Yeah. I mean, even on Shine, we had Paul Jones on harmonica from Alfred Mann. He came in and did the harmonicas on there. So it's been a really lovely collaboration of people and just, they said just watching other people add their musicality to it. It's just been fantastic. It's always great seeing people bring your ideas to like. with their creativity. Yeah.

It's really something to be proud of. Absolutely. I'm very proud of this. Amen. Mm-hmm. Yeah. With all the things that are happening for you, I believe that this is a special year for you.

It's like 25th anniversary. Is that correct? It's my 25th anniversary tour this year with AEG. And we're going to be basically visiting all the major cities in the UK. It's a big tour celebrating that quarter century as a recording artist from the first release of the very first record, the voice, which held the number one spot for 52 weeks in the UK. So it's a celebration of that. It's a celebration of my music over the years. And it's going to be combined with the new stuff with the brilliant Helen Jane Long as well.

So that's what we're all about this year. Yeah. That's really good to celebrate 25 years. and I bet that's going to be fun. Now, Helen, are you going out on tour this year as well? Yeah, I mean, I do, I've always do a concert in London every Christmas. That's on 6th of December. I'll be in London doing that one.

And then I also tour in America. So it's just trying to, this year's being quite a big writing year for me. So I was trying to balance when I was going to be doing my American tour. But I think I'm going to do that next year and then remain more in the UK this year. And then I can join Russell and do some performances with him, and carry on writing and then do a much bigger American tour next year. Okay, that sounds really great. Yeah.

You need to come to Nashville as well. Yeah, I'd love to. I've never done a show there, so yes, please. I'll be there. Can I? You can if you're a good boy. It's a pleasure. Thank you.

I truly love that you guys get along so well. That is really a great plus. Non-stop mayhem. It is crazy stuff. I love it. You know, so many artists on these programs come on. They seem polished and very serious. It's really nice to have a refreshing and experienced lively witty banter and have a really laid-back conversation.

I really appreciate that from you. Life's too short. Yeah. Yeah. It is. It is. You know, we do have a lot of fun and we do send each other silly messages and have a giggle. And I think that's the way, you know, like Ross said, it should be fun.

If it's not, you shouldn't be doing it. Yeah, I agree 100%. I've worked here in Nashville producing artists for over 30 years now. We have a laid-back atmosphere, no worrying, just have some fun doing it, and try and create something that's really positive and good for everybody involved. If you're not having fun on it, then you should be doing something else. Well, I think the thing is, people that come to see you are escaping. That's what music is.

It's all sorts of feelings for people. So you want them to be able to see you, watch you, and feel that they've got into a different place to be entertained, to be relaxed, to be invigorated. Yeah, and music, it's such a powerful tool. I mean, at any point in time, it can take you any place you want to go. Yeah. Both of you have either sang or played on monster movies or TV shows, and when they hear that song, it can take them back to the movie, the TV show,

an experience they were feeling in life. So it's a very powerful tool. Yeah. Music, in my opinion, is the single most largest catalyzer for memories, with regards to human beings. And it doesn't matter where you are. You could be driving along on the M6 motorway and listening to a tune on the radio

and all of a sudden something comes on that means something deeply to you. And immediately those memories, it could be a memory of someone that you've loved deeply that you've lost in your life, a memory of a poignant moment, an amazing anniversary. It could be anything.

But music catalyzes memories. I think like nothing else. Yeah. Yeah. And let's hope that what you two are doing together are going to create more memories and feelings for a loss of people. Amen. Yes.

All right. Well, this has been great conversation, great fun. It has been a true pleasure having the both of you on. Thanks, Tony. Much appreciated you. No, thank you for having us. Thanks so much for your time, Tony. Thank you.

It's been my pleasure. Thanks again. Thanks for joining us today. We hope you enjoyed the show. This has been a Tony Mantor production. For more information, contact media at platonucic.com.