Nana's long goodbye、from manchestereveningnews.co.ukから♪

Nana's long goodbye
from　manchestereveningnews.co.ukから♪
Nana's long goodbye
Martin Hutchinson
14/ 8/2007

BESPECTACLED star Nana Mouskouri is instantly recognisable, and has been for more than 40 years.

In fact, She made her first record 50 years ago, and has been touring pretty much constantly since 1960. However, as she approaches her mid-seventies, she has decided to retire from touring – but not before she has thanked her loyal fans with a Farewell World Tour.

Born in Crete in 1934, she moved with her family to Athens where she and her sister studied at the prestigious Athens Conservatoire. Her distinctive voice is the result of a vocal cord flaw – instead of hers being of equal size, one is thicker than the other.

She spent eight years at the Conservatoire studying classical music with opera in mind. However, she experimented with jazz, her professor was furious and she was expelled.

Nana began to sing in jazz clubs, which led to a meeting with noted Greek composer Manos Hadjidakis. He became her mentor and she won the Greek Song Festival two years running.

In 1961 Nana recorded her most famous song, ‘The White Rose of Athens’, and her mastery of languages (she speaks half a dozen) ensured that her popularity grew to be global (she even represented Luxembourg in the 1963 Eurovision Song Contest).

She is one of simply the most successful female singers in history with over 300 gold, platinum and diamond discs. Added to that she took over from Audrey Hepburn as a Unicef Ambassador and has also served Greece as an MEP.

Apart from the languages she can actually speak – she has also recorded songs in Japanese, Korean, Hebrew and Welsh! She said: “It’s nice to be able to speak to the audience in their own language and to perform their own folk songs also.”

Touring

She explains: “I’m not actually retiring from singing, just from touring. If people still want me to sing I will, but I just won’t be touring.

"I wanted to quit while I was still healthy.”

“I’ll miss it. I’ve lived all my life in hotels – not that I want to say bad things about that. I’ve been lucky enough to travel, and I’ll still be travelling. I have homes in Paris, Geneva and Athens, plus I’ll be doing my humanitarian work.”

And it has been a full life for Nana so far: “I’ve worked with so many great artists like Quincy Jones and Harry Belafonte. But most of all, I’ve been so lucky to have been loved by so many people. The audiences who come to my shows have always shown me so much love.

"A career is not just the big things. Sad things happen, but as a Greek I am optimistic, you learn to overcome bad things and it helps you to progress.

“But so many good things have happened to me... and I am also proud that I am able to help with Unicef and of course being a mother to two wonderful children.”

Speaking about her final tour she said: "It started in 2005 and will end next year in 2008. You have to take time to do the whole world and I want to take the opportunity to thank fans for listening to me for so many years.”

“I have a seven-piece band, but it has a big sound. I can’t take a full orchestra round with me. I think it’s a very good programme on the evening. There’s a small film at the beginning showing my history and then I ’ll tell my story with my songs.

“There’s will be a variety of songs, from my beginnings with classical music and through my pop and jazz songs. There’s ’ll be a real diversity of cultures.”

The British leg of Nana Mouskouri’s Farewell Tour comes to Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall on Wednesday, October 31. Tickets, priced £32.50 and £28.50 are available by calling 0161 907 9000 or logging on to bridgewater-hall.co.uk .