| All about Donny | - Born on 9 December 1957, Donny Osmond started on stage as a young child with his brothers on The Andy Williams Show, in the late 60s and early 70s.
- Onstage by the age of five, on tour by eight and receiving 50,000 fan letters a week by the time he was thirteen, Donny Osmond was the original pop idol. The seventh of nine children born into a strict Mormon family in Utah, Donny made his musical debut on the Andy Williams Show just before his sixth birthday with his singing brothers, The Osmonds.
- Donny was the centerpiece of the band and later forged a very successful solo career, most notably with the hit 'Puppy Love' in 1972, and later teamed with sister Marie for a hit TV show.
- In 1992 Donny enjoyed a five-year run as the lead in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. He next made a splash in 1998 with a new daytime talk show co-hosted by sister Marie.
- His latest album, 'What I Meant To Say' is his 54th!
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Have you got the same fans that have stuck with you over the past 30 years and what's been their reaction to your new album, which you've worked with with Gary Barlow, formerly of Take That?
 | | Donny in Joseph. |
The fans are so supportive especially for this album - my 54th - which is so different to all the things I've done before. This is the first time that I've written the material and produced it along with Elliot Kennedy and Gary Barlow. Gary is a musical genius and when we get together we have such a great time. This is the second album we've done together and every time we get together it just works. The lyrics in What I Meant To Say are so cool and we wrote them in four hours. Are you worried about this album as you've written and produced the material? The worry was there but it stopped after we mixed it. You always worry when you start painting a picture but when its all done, you walk away because it's satisfactory. We recorded over 30 songs and then narrowed done to these 14 so it's really got the cream of the crop. After 42 years in showbusiness there's a certain feeling when you sing your own lyrics and harmonies that you can't ever replace. How did you choose the cover songs for the album? There's certain criteria that I followed. I wanted a torch ballad that everyone knows so I chose 'I Wanna Know What Love Is' and I thought I'd do a George Michael song and 'Faith' kept coming up so I did a cheeky version with me laughing in the middle! That was real fun. You've been in the music business for 42 years, starting off as a child. Was it difficult to grow up without a normal childhood? | "I know I missed out on what is normal for most children but It was such a great experience" | | Donny Osmond |
Well, what is normal? For me normal was going on stage and performing for people. It was normal to me to be working with my brothers and travelling around. I know I missed out on what is normal for most children but It was such a great experience to be learning a good work ethic, the experiences of being 13, 14, 15听 and dealing with hysteria and the musical learning curve I was on since I was five. You cannot replace all that. Did you ever have any problems as you were the most popular Osmond - did your brothers ever get jealous? I wrote a book in 1997 and my brothers were interviewed for it and for the first time I found out that my brothers had some hard feelings towards my career as they really wanted careers in the direction of Crazy Horses. They wanted to be more rock and roll but because of my reputation as a teeny bopper it squashed the rock and roll side of our show business. But although the 'Puppy Love' squashed that, it was OK as it was a good career for me and it kept us going but they kinda regretted it. You have a great voice - but you nearly had it taken away from you when you were surfing. What happened there? I didn't have a voice a little over a year ago I had to have an operation on my neck and have the third, fourth and fifth vertebrae as I almost broke my neck body surfing. It was in Hawaii on the north shore and as soon as I hit the shore I heard it crack and I thought 'Oh no please' but everything still worked but a week alter I lost the use of my right arm so had to go quickly and have it fixed. But afterwards I didn't have a voice and it took me three or four months of nothing but therapy, singing and rehearsing again and again. I was committed to deliver this album and eventually everything came back. Interestingly my voice has a harder element to it which I kinda like although I'm not sure whether it's due to maturity or the metal plate in my throat. So there is a little different element in my voice in this album. | 
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