The This Morning presenter will perform two songs from the hit musical Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat for a tour celebrating knights and dames of the entertainment industry, with music by Joseph composers Lord Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Sir Tim Rice, Sir Elton John, Sir Cliff Richard, Dame Shirley Bassey, and Sir Paul McCartney among others.
Phil will be hosting the show, featuring performances from West End stars including Danielle Hope, Liam Doyle, Laura Tebbutt and Andy Coxon, as well dusting off his own vocal chords to sing on stage for the first time in years.
Speaking at a rehearsal for The Knights Of Music tour in London, he said: “It will be the first time in 19 years I’ve sung Joseph and 17 years since I’ve sung on stage. What’s lovely is for everyone who saw saw it back then, it’s a real bit of nostalgia.”
Phil, 54, revealed he has barely used his singing voice since his last stage performance.
“It seemed OK, it’s not been used other than for a bit of karaoke. I have all my best ideas in the shower so I don’t even sing then. I’m normally concentrating on other things because it’s the only place there isn’t a phone.”
Phil recently dusted off the multi-coloured coat he wore for his stage performances at the London Palladium in 1993 but said he does not think he will be sporting it again for the tour.
He said: “It still does up round the middle, I would even go so far as to say it’s even less snug but I am not even sure we will do a coat, I don’t know where we are with that yet. It’s more about the songs.”
He added: “This one is riddled in controversy because I nicked it on my last night at the Palladium and they asked for it back.
“I thought if I walk out of the building I will never know which one is mine so I put it in the boot of the car and the wardrobe mistress went spare and said it had to come back.
“Because I was going on the road we reached a compromise and I used that coat for all the publicity and then I was allowed to keep it.
“I have the loincloth as well but I’m not entirely sure that would fit, I think I had a 26 or 27-inch waist then and it’s 30 now. It’s been in the wardrobe, tucked right up at the end.
“It’s not one of those things I put in even on my own or a costume party. I would be scared it would get a cigarette burn or wine spilt on it.”
Phil will be reviving two songs for the musical tour and said most of the lyrics were still fresh in his mind, adding: “When you’ve done something I can’t remember how many times, it’s in there somewhere. I can still remember all the colours in the right order so it’s strange what goes in and stays.
“It was such an extraordinary time of my life, it was a bizarre thing to even be asked to do because it was so far away from what I ever planned or thought about doing and the risks were enormous if I had got it wrong.”
The former children’s television presenter took over the role from Jason Donovan in 1993.
He said: ”This was a show Jason Donovan opened and packed out every night. If I had got it wrong, it would have been a hideous disaster.”
The self-proclaimed “rubbish dancer” added he luckily will not have to learn any complicated choreography for the numbers on the new tour.
The Knights Of Music will visit theatres in Cardiff, Ipswich, Northampton and Southampton between April 21 and April 24.
Tickets are available at www.knightsofmusic.co.uk/tourdates
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