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Q & A from Garry and Barry and other random thoughts (Very Long)
First let me post a disclaimer: Please bear with me as I post this discussion. I’m writing from memory (that could be a problem – lol!) I’ve never attended a convention before so I have idea how these Q & A’s compare to previous ones. I know it’s not 100% accurate and my thoughts may jump around a bit. Posting is not in any particular order. Anyone who was at the convention, please feel free to add in thoughts/comments that I may have forgotten or have mixed up.
Garry’s Q & A
At this session people were allowed to ask questions, nothing was prepared in advance by Garry. What I liked about this was after the question was asked, Garry sometimes gave a quick comment or statement back, but then he took his time, thought about the question and then answered it. He didn’t rush and I think he spoke to us for a little over an hour.
Manilow TV: On Manilow.com they will post videos from prior TV shows, concerts, etc. There is a whole vault of information that will be available to view for a month. It can be viewed as many times as you wish. Then the next month it will change to another show/concert. They will not be available for download and there will be a monthly fee involved. (No fee was given.) Barry likes to view all shows before they are released and there are also other logistics involved before items like this are released to the public in a DVD format. Therefore, it’s their feeling that this is the best way right now to provide the fans what they are looking for.
Harmony: Unfortunately no good news. They continue to look for producers. Every time they think they’re good to go, something falls through.
Audio biography: This is still in the works. They were approached a few years ago to make a coffee table book. They liked the idea, but also wanted to include CD’s. If I recall correctly the publisher wasn’t interested in the CD’s, so I believe Garry said this is something they will do on their own. There’s so much information out there that it’s taking a long time to put together.
Debra Byrd: She was not injured during American Idol and she is fine. There was another Debbie on the staff who was hurt.
Suzanne Somers: Garry asked if anyone was going to attend her lecture. Garry stated Suzanne has been researching and interviewing specialists for years about bio-identical hormones, aging, health, writing books, going on talk shows, lecturing, etc. He stated that now finally other professionals are starting to take her seriously and beginning to listen. Also said she’s very intelligent.
Barry Grams: They will be few and far between. With the internet news travels fast and the Grams are obsolete by the time they are written. Many questions to “Ask Barry” became redundant. At some point they will print another Ask Barry. I believe at this point Garry went on a tangent and spoke about his parents. He was pretty funny here recalling some of the things they used to do. His dad was “Madman Mickey” and he would send messages in the Grams asking us to send cookies. They would get so many chocolate chip cookies they needed a storage room and Garry would ask what would they do with all of them?! He also recalled that in the One Voice album an envelope was included and for $6 fans could join the fan club. At the time credit cards could not be used so they received 100’s of replies and the envelopes were filled with cash. The post office was delivering tubs full of mail to a little 2 person office. After a couple of months Garry didn’t see the money deposited and wondered where the money was. Mickey was like “Well, you know your mother.” Kate would sit and write a beautifully personalized handwritten note to every single person and she wasn’t going to deposit the money until every single person got a thank you note. Garry was like, “For Gods sake, just go into the office in the middle of the night, take the money out of the envelopes and deposit the money. Just leave the envelopes for Mom!” For those of you who know Garry, he used some colorful words telling his stories. However, he was very endearing towards his parents saying how great and funny they were.
Introduced Gary Oye: I believe also during the discussion of the Barry Grams, Garry mentioned going to Manilow.com, the B-net and the Ning site for news/information. During this point he asked if Gary was in the audience and had his stand up to be recognized for the B-net and the wealth of information that Gary provides.
Economy: He asked how we were all doing with the current economy and did we think it was getting better. General consensus is that it’s very tough and not getting better. I think at this point he jumped to Front Row Manilow and said they had been approached by Ticket Master to do auction bidding for front row seats. I believe he said Ticket Master wanted to impose a fee and they thought that was crazy and they could do the same thing themselves and that’s how FRM came about. He also asked due to the economy if we felt the fan club should offer a variety of ticket prices for fans to purchase or continue as they have been. General consensus was to keep it as it has been. (My personal thought is to offer a variety.)
Desert Magazine 2009 The Best of the Valley: is on sale in the Manilow store for $20. The proceeds will be given to the Manilow Fund for Health and Hope. For those who may not know, Barry was voted as Best of the Valley Celebrity for his music program for the schools. This is a monthly magazine of the daily newspaper Desert Sun. He introduced Rick Green who was responsible for this and is always positive about Barry. For local news on Barry go to mydesert.com/barrymanilow. Garry also mentioned that if the town you live in has a local paper owned by Gannett News, to support the paper as that’s who owns Desert Sun.
Mentoring program: Someone mentioned they were disappointed that American Idol didn’t show more of Barry mentoring the contestants. Garry agreed stating he doesn’t know what happened there and that Barry spoke to the kids for quite a while. At one point there was talk about opening a charter school so teachers could be hired to mentor the students and promote music. Logistics made this impossible. Barry started the music donations instead. However, the question reminded Garry that a while back, Barry would sometimes stop at colleges while on tour to talk to the music students and share his experiences. He may bring it up to Barry again to see about stopping at area colleges while performing the arena shows if time allows.
Hilton Contract & future conventions: There are no plans to leave the Hilton and fully expects that the contract will be extended. He asked when and where we’d like the next convention. General consensus is keep the convention in Vegas as long as Barry is performing there. Fans would love it if it would fall during Barry’s birthday week. Kirsten Kief, Garry’s daughter, (or KK as Garry calls her) asked if we’d like the convention on a cruise. That had a large positive response, but that probably won’t happen as Barry doesn’t do well with water. Garry was pretty funny at this point.
Stiletto auditions: someone saw and ad for auditions. This has nothing to do with Barry. Stiletto also provides the entertainment for Holland America Cruise ships and that’s what this ad was regarding.
Barry’s Q & A
Barry’s Q & A was shorter. Maybe ½ hour or a little longer. Kye “MC’d” the Q & A from prepared questions. It was funny as Barry tried to read the questions, but needed to put on his reading glasses, so Kye took the questions and read them to Barry. I will be truthful and tell you I don’t remember a lot of Barry’s Q & A, so again if I’ve missed things, please remind me!
Before answering the questions, Barry pulled someone from the audience to sit with him for a few minutes. I honestly don’t remember what he talked to her about, but I do believe while she was up there he asked if we liked the Mayflower show. We all gave him a rousing ovation. He wondered how we thought the “Civilians” liked the show, if they understood it & if he should continue performing the songs. Of course we want the songs to remain. As far as the civilians it was a mixed reaction. Keely spoke up and said she thinks the civilians will grow to like it if they just keep playing it. This also got a rousing response. Barry at this point also took the time to introduce the backup singers, band members & technical personnel.
What gives him energy: His dogs. They make him happy and loves animals. Music too of course.
5 favorite non hit songs: in no particular order I Am Your Child, Sandra, If I Should Love Again, Who Needs to Dream and Every Single Day. He asked if his backup singers ever heard If I Should Love Again and they said no. Barry said it was a beautiful song. (Hum, wonder if we’ll hear it at some point?) Barry introduced Enoch Andersonto us. He was responsible for writing Sandra, I Want To Be Somebody's Baby and several of the Mayflower songs.
What would do for a living if not in music: maybe a writer or something creative. Definitely not a waiter or delivery person. These got a chuckle from the band members and audience. He was like “Can you see me doing that?!” He mentioned spilling drinks on people like he did in “Manilow Talks”.
Performing in a Broadway show: Not for him. It’s too restricted. You have to stand on the same mark every night, take very precise steps, etc as one wrong move could cause an accident. At this point he had Keely, Monica & Melanie relay some of their Broadway experiences. They all agree that Barry couldn’t do Broadway as he likes to change it up and gets bored very easily.
UK appearance/Hollywood Bowl: He was given the ok by Garry to announce that he’d be back in the UK at the Proms in the Park in September. He’s excited about the Hollywood Bowl as he will have an orchestra playing with them.
Record a children’s CD: No, he doesn’t like kids. Then he laughed and said he does like kids, but when they’re older and not little babies. You had to be there to see his gestures trying to explain what he meant.
Award he's proudest of: throughout his career he's proudest of winning the Emmy.
What cologne he wears: Jo Malone.
Decades CD’s: he asked us if we weren’t all sick of the decades CD’s. He went on to say that making the 50’s CD was his favorite decade to record as the songs were old enough that he felt he could play around with the arrangements more. He couldn’t do that as much with the other decades. He is working on an original CD (no mention of when it will be released) and said it would be quite different. He introduced us to someone that he’s been working with and again I apologize that I cannot remember his name. This gentleman spoke for a minute saying that it’s quite exciting and it’ll be like something we’ve never heard before. They never came out saying it was the Rock & Roll album, but I presume that’s what they were talking about.
This is honestly all I can recall of Barry’s Q & A.
Random thoughts: I’m interested to see if Barry keeps any of/all of the Mayflower segment in his upcoming shows. If he doesn’t, it would be a shame as it was performed like a theater production. I’d hate to see all their hard work not showcased to the audiences. I think it would be kind of nice to keep maybe 3 songs in each nights show and mix up the song order for the fans that are there. Kind of like a lucky strike extra, but know exactly which 3 songs they’ll perform each of the Thurs, Fri & Sat shows.
During the lunch/dinner/breakfast buffets it was all Mayflower music all the time. I loved it. During the formal dinner when we walked into the ballroom they had 2 pairs of dancers behind screens giving the appearance of shadow dancing. Then right before we were served dinner they had the dancers come out onto the platforms and they danced for us. If I recall correctly they were dancing to They Dance.
I’d like to thank Vikki, Kirsten, Garry, K.C. – the MC, Maximillian (sp?) the DJ, Chris, Tammy & Lynn from Stiletto, Keely, Kye, Monica & Melanie, the entire band, technical crew and all the others who worked so hard to provide a fun weekend for us. Garry – all of your staff earned a well deserved raise!
Garry’s Q & A
At this session people were allowed to ask questions, nothing was prepared in advance by Garry. What I liked about this was after the question was asked, Garry sometimes gave a quick comment or statement back, but then he took his time, thought about the question and then answered it. He didn’t rush and I think he spoke to us for a little over an hour.
Manilow TV: On Manilow.com they will post videos from prior TV shows, concerts, etc. There is a whole vault of information that will be available to view for a month. It can be viewed as many times as you wish. Then the next month it will change to another show/concert. They will not be available for download and there will be a monthly fee involved. (No fee was given.) Barry likes to view all shows before they are released and there are also other logistics involved before items like this are released to the public in a DVD format. Therefore, it’s their feeling that this is the best way right now to provide the fans what they are looking for.
Harmony: Unfortunately no good news. They continue to look for producers. Every time they think they’re good to go, something falls through.
Audio biography: This is still in the works. They were approached a few years ago to make a coffee table book. They liked the idea, but also wanted to include CD’s. If I recall correctly the publisher wasn’t interested in the CD’s, so I believe Garry said this is something they will do on their own. There’s so much information out there that it’s taking a long time to put together.
Debra Byrd: She was not injured during American Idol and she is fine. There was another Debbie on the staff who was hurt.
Suzanne Somers: Garry asked if anyone was going to attend her lecture. Garry stated Suzanne has been researching and interviewing specialists for years about bio-identical hormones, aging, health, writing books, going on talk shows, lecturing, etc. He stated that now finally other professionals are starting to take her seriously and beginning to listen. Also said she’s very intelligent.
Barry Grams: They will be few and far between. With the internet news travels fast and the Grams are obsolete by the time they are written. Many questions to “Ask Barry” became redundant. At some point they will print another Ask Barry. I believe at this point Garry went on a tangent and spoke about his parents. He was pretty funny here recalling some of the things they used to do. His dad was “Madman Mickey” and he would send messages in the Grams asking us to send cookies. They would get so many chocolate chip cookies they needed a storage room and Garry would ask what would they do with all of them?! He also recalled that in the One Voice album an envelope was included and for $6 fans could join the fan club. At the time credit cards could not be used so they received 100’s of replies and the envelopes were filled with cash. The post office was delivering tubs full of mail to a little 2 person office. After a couple of months Garry didn’t see the money deposited and wondered where the money was. Mickey was like “Well, you know your mother.” Kate would sit and write a beautifully personalized handwritten note to every single person and she wasn’t going to deposit the money until every single person got a thank you note. Garry was like, “For Gods sake, just go into the office in the middle of the night, take the money out of the envelopes and deposit the money. Just leave the envelopes for Mom!” For those of you who know Garry, he used some colorful words telling his stories. However, he was very endearing towards his parents saying how great and funny they were.
Introduced Gary Oye: I believe also during the discussion of the Barry Grams, Garry mentioned going to Manilow.com, the B-net and the Ning site for news/information. During this point he asked if Gary was in the audience and had his stand up to be recognized for the B-net and the wealth of information that Gary provides.
Economy: He asked how we were all doing with the current economy and did we think it was getting better. General consensus is that it’s very tough and not getting better. I think at this point he jumped to Front Row Manilow and said they had been approached by Ticket Master to do auction bidding for front row seats. I believe he said Ticket Master wanted to impose a fee and they thought that was crazy and they could do the same thing themselves and that’s how FRM came about. He also asked due to the economy if we felt the fan club should offer a variety of ticket prices for fans to purchase or continue as they have been. General consensus was to keep it as it has been. (My personal thought is to offer a variety.)
Desert Magazine 2009 The Best of the Valley: is on sale in the Manilow store for $20. The proceeds will be given to the Manilow Fund for Health and Hope. For those who may not know, Barry was voted as Best of the Valley Celebrity for his music program for the schools. This is a monthly magazine of the daily newspaper Desert Sun. He introduced Rick Green who was responsible for this and is always positive about Barry. For local news on Barry go to mydesert.com/barrymanilow. Garry also mentioned that if the town you live in has a local paper owned by Gannett News, to support the paper as that’s who owns Desert Sun.
Mentoring program: Someone mentioned they were disappointed that American Idol didn’t show more of Barry mentoring the contestants. Garry agreed stating he doesn’t know what happened there and that Barry spoke to the kids for quite a while. At one point there was talk about opening a charter school so teachers could be hired to mentor the students and promote music. Logistics made this impossible. Barry started the music donations instead. However, the question reminded Garry that a while back, Barry would sometimes stop at colleges while on tour to talk to the music students and share his experiences. He may bring it up to Barry again to see about stopping at area colleges while performing the arena shows if time allows.
Hilton Contract & future conventions: There are no plans to leave the Hilton and fully expects that the contract will be extended. He asked when and where we’d like the next convention. General consensus is keep the convention in Vegas as long as Barry is performing there. Fans would love it if it would fall during Barry’s birthday week. Kirsten Kief, Garry’s daughter, (or KK as Garry calls her) asked if we’d like the convention on a cruise. That had a large positive response, but that probably won’t happen as Barry doesn’t do well with water. Garry was pretty funny at this point.
Stiletto auditions: someone saw and ad for auditions. This has nothing to do with Barry. Stiletto also provides the entertainment for Holland America Cruise ships and that’s what this ad was regarding.
Barry’s Q & A
Barry’s Q & A was shorter. Maybe ½ hour or a little longer. Kye “MC’d” the Q & A from prepared questions. It was funny as Barry tried to read the questions, but needed to put on his reading glasses, so Kye took the questions and read them to Barry. I will be truthful and tell you I don’t remember a lot of Barry’s Q & A, so again if I’ve missed things, please remind me!
Before answering the questions, Barry pulled someone from the audience to sit with him for a few minutes. I honestly don’t remember what he talked to her about, but I do believe while she was up there he asked if we liked the Mayflower show. We all gave him a rousing ovation. He wondered how we thought the “Civilians” liked the show, if they understood it & if he should continue performing the songs. Of course we want the songs to remain. As far as the civilians it was a mixed reaction. Keely spoke up and said she thinks the civilians will grow to like it if they just keep playing it. This also got a rousing response. Barry at this point also took the time to introduce the backup singers, band members & technical personnel.
What gives him energy: His dogs. They make him happy and loves animals. Music too of course.
5 favorite non hit songs: in no particular order I Am Your Child, Sandra, If I Should Love Again, Who Needs to Dream and Every Single Day. He asked if his backup singers ever heard If I Should Love Again and they said no. Barry said it was a beautiful song. (Hum, wonder if we’ll hear it at some point?) Barry introduced Enoch Andersonto us. He was responsible for writing Sandra, I Want To Be Somebody's Baby and several of the Mayflower songs.
What would do for a living if not in music: maybe a writer or something creative. Definitely not a waiter or delivery person. These got a chuckle from the band members and audience. He was like “Can you see me doing that?!” He mentioned spilling drinks on people like he did in “Manilow Talks”.
Performing in a Broadway show: Not for him. It’s too restricted. You have to stand on the same mark every night, take very precise steps, etc as one wrong move could cause an accident. At this point he had Keely, Monica & Melanie relay some of their Broadway experiences. They all agree that Barry couldn’t do Broadway as he likes to change it up and gets bored very easily.
UK appearance/Hollywood Bowl: He was given the ok by Garry to announce that he’d be back in the UK at the Proms in the Park in September. He’s excited about the Hollywood Bowl as he will have an orchestra playing with them.
Record a children’s CD: No, he doesn’t like kids. Then he laughed and said he does like kids, but when they’re older and not little babies. You had to be there to see his gestures trying to explain what he meant.
Award he's proudest of: throughout his career he's proudest of winning the Emmy.
What cologne he wears: Jo Malone.
Decades CD’s: he asked us if we weren’t all sick of the decades CD’s. He went on to say that making the 50’s CD was his favorite decade to record as the songs were old enough that he felt he could play around with the arrangements more. He couldn’t do that as much with the other decades. He is working on an original CD (no mention of when it will be released) and said it would be quite different. He introduced us to someone that he’s been working with and again I apologize that I cannot remember his name. This gentleman spoke for a minute saying that it’s quite exciting and it’ll be like something we’ve never heard before. They never came out saying it was the Rock & Roll album, but I presume that’s what they were talking about.
This is honestly all I can recall of Barry’s Q & A.
Random thoughts: I’m interested to see if Barry keeps any of/all of the Mayflower segment in his upcoming shows. If he doesn’t, it would be a shame as it was performed like a theater production. I’d hate to see all their hard work not showcased to the audiences. I think it would be kind of nice to keep maybe 3 songs in each nights show and mix up the song order for the fans that are there. Kind of like a lucky strike extra, but know exactly which 3 songs they’ll perform each of the Thurs, Fri & Sat shows.
During the lunch/dinner/breakfast buffets it was all Mayflower music all the time. I loved it. During the formal dinner when we walked into the ballroom they had 2 pairs of dancers behind screens giving the appearance of shadow dancing. Then right before we were served dinner they had the dancers come out onto the platforms and they danced for us. If I recall correctly they were dancing to They Dance.
I’d like to thank Vikki, Kirsten, Garry, K.C. – the MC, Maximillian (sp?) the DJ, Chris, Tammy & Lynn from Stiletto, Keely, Kye, Monica & Melanie, the entire band, technical crew and all the others who worked so hard to provide a fun weekend for us. Garry – all of your staff earned a well deserved raise!
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Linda A on -
Vi,
You're very welcome. I'm so happy for all the UK fans that Barry will be back to see you again. And this time it won't be in the dead of winter! Enjoy the PROMS and your October trip.
Linda
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Permalink Reply by Patsy on -
Hi Linda
Thank you for generously giving your review and Q & A session. Reading it was so enthralling as we all love to hear any information and snippets of news pertaining to Barry.
Thanks again,
Patsy.
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Permalink Reply by Darlene Corio on -
Linda,
Great job. Very impressed that you managed to remember all of this as I don't think I could have done it. It was a great time unfortunately I don't think we got any news that we all have been waiting for. Would have liked it better if Barry was'nt so vauge on what exactly this new CD is going to be. Oh well I guess we will have to wait and learn to be patient.
Darlene
P.S if anyone is interested I posted some photos from the convention on my page.
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Permalink Reply by Linda A on
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Darlene,
It was great spending the my Barry weekend with you. You should've seen me yesterday trying to remember this stuff. While doing household work, trying to unpack, etc, things would keep popping up in my mind. I'd stop and write all my thoughts down in that notebook I brought with me to Vegas and never used! Took me all day to get my work done as I kept stopping!
Talk to you soon.
Linda
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Permalink Reply by Linda LaRose on -
Hello Linda: For someone who has never gone to a convention and is writing from memory, what a FANTASTIC job you shared with us~! Thanks for all the great info and updates. Your Friend, Linda LaRose
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Permalink Reply by Linda A on
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Thanks everyone for the positive feedback. I know what it feels like to be on the other end waiting for posts of show and convention feedback. I promised myself that I would repay the favor. I wasn't able to post while in Vegas as I don't have a laptop and we didn't get back to the East Coast until dinner time on Monday night. Then it took me all day on Tuesday to try and recall everything that was discussed. I'm glad everyone seems to be enjoying what I've written.
Linda
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Permalink Reply by Leah Fallico on
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Hi, Linda. Thanks so much -- you did a really great job. I dont' get to go to LV as often as some, but I feel very fortunate to have seen Barry's show a few times since 2007 -- LV and arena shows. I try to be comprehensive in reporting when I get back. I know how anxious I am to hear what went on at any show but certainly at extra special shows (convention or when large groups of fans are going to be there for whatever reason). You made me laugh when you were saying how you'd be trying to do something and stopping to make notes. That's what I do myself -- a couple of times we were driving; a couple of times I was waiting for/on a plane and just kept writing in my notebook as things occurred to me. And it does take a long time to type it up and get it all just right. But it's so worth it because it's a wonderful memory for me when I go back later & read what I wrote. And it's appreciated by the fans on the home front. Thanks again -- hope by now you're putting your feet up and just reliving the wonderful week-end.
Leah/Chicago
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Permalink Reply by dana on -
wow you have a great memory i remembered after i read your blog i forgot about Barry not wanting to do broadway,
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Permalink Reply by Ann M on -
Hello Linda A,
Thanks for the terrific write-up on the convention. I am so sorry I had to miss it, I knew it would be special once I heard about the songs from the Mayflower being added to the shows. I'm also sorry to hear that "Harmony" is still in limbo. It was very touching to know that Garry mentioned his parents, they were two terrific people and I miss them very much. The earlier conventions were extra special. I will never forget meeting them for the first time. Madman in Chicago and dear sweet Kate in Toronto! Those are the names I know them by and always will refer them by. Such precious memories I hold. Take care and thanks again for the details you gave us.
Ann M
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