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28.07.06
MATT MONRO TRIBUTE AT GROSVENOR HOUSE
by Michelle Monro
When I lost my dad it was the saddest day of my life and the weeks that followed were blurry and bitterly painful. People who meant well said inane things like “time heals”, “he’s in a better place” “life goes on”, it got to the point where I wanted to physically hit someone as if somehow that would ease the torment.
Within a year I moved house thinking that by starting afresh it would be something new to focus on, but I regretted selling the house that I had lived in with my father for over 20 years and I got angrier and angrier at the world.
What angered me the most was that after all the things that my father had achieved in his life, not only for his art, but for charity, representing his country, and his contribution to the British music industry, no-one came forward to discuss a tribute or indeed and accolade of any kind. Video was the new technology and dad had been in talks to tape three concerts later that year for public release but as such very little footage existed. Television stations, thinking they were saving money, had taped over thousands of old programmes and tracking footage down became a quest.
I obsessed over the fact that my father wasn’t being recognised by his peers, not one television programme was made nor a past show aired and after waiting two years I decided enough was enough. I thought long and hard on what was the best way to counteract this and decided a “Tribute Evening” would rectify all the wrongs and who would be the best person to host such an event – me of course. I rashly picked up the telephone and booked the Grosvenor House Hotel for Sunday 22nd February 1987.
It couldn’t be too hard to host an event for 1500 people and raise money for Cancer Research could it? I booked the room, arranged the menus and printed invitations. I sold blank pages in a brochure to friends and colleagues who had been connected to my father throughout his career. I wrote hundreds of letter on a typewriter and spent ridiculous sums of money on postage. I started getting requests and cheques for tickets.
Late one night in October, I laid in bed working out my break even point and having done so, felt sick for days, but there was no turning back. The dye had been cast.
I was selling tickets for £50.00 each, which was pricey in those days and yet at that point all the attendees were getting for their money was dinner. I wanted people to pay tribute to my father, and to know they missed him as much as I did. I came to a decision that a decent “Top Table” was needed, but although this sounds awful, I didn’t want it full of celebrities who meant nothing to us, that would only be there to gain their own publicity.
Word got out and before I knew it people were ringing me offering to do whatever they could, the top table wasn’t big enough, the brochure was brimming and the tickets had sold out.
I had a Green Room full of donated champagne, a Toastmaster on board, prizes donated for raffles and tombola and offers of encouragement from every orifice. What I didn’t have was a top name for my cabaret.
The thing with me is that it was no good having just anyone, everything related to the tribute which was named “By Request” had a tie in to my father and the finale of the evening was to be a 100 strong choir who sang acapello to a medley of dad’s music, this to be sung on stage with enormous backdrops showing video footage of my father. It was to be a very emotional and powerful ending to what I hoped would be a fantastic evening.
But still I didn’t have a big star name, and then my white knight came along, Joe Longthorne, who was at the height of his career, had won every accolade, had his own television series and was at the top of his game rang me out of the blue. He offered to be my escort at the top table for the evening and absolutely tore the room apart with his cabaret performance. He not only offered his services for free but also was there because he genuinely admired my father. Not once did he throw a wobbler because he wasn’t closing the show, which is what every star would normally expect, thus being effectively top of the bill, he asked what he could contribute and accepted his fate humbly. That is the mark of a true star.
Joe usually does a tribute in his stage shows to dad, which is a great honour in itself. He always talked highly of my father and his voice, but in fact Joe has the most amazing voice and a range that very few singers could compete with.
Joe is a very unassuming gentle man; he did me and my family a great service that night and contributed in making the evening a resounding success. He himself has overcome such adversity over the years and although he has won many a fight with his illness, he hasn’t won the war. I have found that the truly great people in life suffer greatly and are taken away from us far too early but that is only because they have a greater destiny, a bigger cause, it is the only acceptable explanation that appeases me.
I have only met Joe a handful of times in my life, and each time he has been more gracious than the last, and although I do not know him really well, he will always have a very special place in my heart. There are not many people who can make me see reason when I don’t want to, but the one thing he did for me that evening when he stepped on that stage at The Grosvenor House Hotel, was that he took away my anger at the world. He made me realise that you don’t need corporations and television companies to acknowledge what a great talent the world has lost, you just need the people, people who love and admire the legend that is Matt Monro, and the amazing legacy he left behind.
Through his music, he lives on.
Thanks Joe
Michelle Monro xxx
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