Big Interview: Peter Corry talks about his upcoming tour of Thank You for the Musicals, 30 years in the music industry and his recent MBE

Indeed, he needs to be fit as a fiddle as touring and the sheer vocal athleticism and stage action involved in a show can be physically draining.

“Yes, it can be exhausting. I did a tour in Holland towards the end of last year for a month and I certainly felt that I was tired from singing at the end of every night. It's like any other physical activity, it does take it out of you. It might have been because I was running about the stage but I lost about half a stone without even trying, which was great!"

Celebrated for his easy charm, emotional connection to the audience and that beautiful tenor voice that can belt out big showtunes and lush ballads with equal mastery, Peter says the timbre of his voice hasn’t changed hugely over the years, for which he is thankful.

“It’s changed a bit, but I think I've been quite lucky. Recently, I came across something on YouTube of Sinatra singing – and I'm not comparing myself to him, by the way – it was something he was in in Madison Square Gardens and he was around the age I am now, and I did think he sounded very different to what he used to when you saw him at his height.”

He adds: “What comes with age is more experience and also it's more about choosing the songs that are suitable for you, as much as anything else. And not just vocally, but also where you are in life.”

Where Peter is in life at the moment is preparing for another run of his sensational show, Thank You for the Musicals. After a sold-out tour last year, his company, Peter Corry Productions, is bringing the musical extravaganza back to new venues across the province, including the Portico Arts Centre in Portaferry, The Braid in Ballymena and four shows at the MAC in Belfast.

"This show is a real celebration of all the best songs in musical theatre. The audience can expect everything from uplifting toe tappers to emotional and heart felt songs, but I can guarantee that they will know and love them all!”

He will be joined on stage by talented artists; Sean O’Neill, Jay Hutchinson, Nik Parks, Seanna Hutchinson, Anna Tennyson and Ciara Power.

Peter has graced the stage in iconic roles such as the formidable Inspector Javert in both the West End and UK tour of Les Misérables, as well as Sweeney in Sweeney Todd, Fagin in Oliver, and Jamie in The Last 5 Years.

"The baddies are always the best parts to play. I think there's a charisma that goes with playing a villain. If you're doing it right there’s nearly a chill in the air from the atmosphere you're trying to create.”

Peter was recently awarded an MBE for his illustrious career in musical theatre, something he describes as a “thrill and a huge surprise”.

“Just to get the chance to have a day with my kids and my wife in London and the experience of it all was terrific. Princess Anne presented the MBE and she was very talkative, very nice. What I loved when I was chatting to her was that we got onto the subject of young people performing and she said that she had had drama lessons when she was a child and how they stuck by her in life.

"That is what I say to young people – it's not about finding stars, it's about giving life skills that they can take forward and that ability to be able to stand up and communicate to others what you're thinking, it stands by you right through life no matter what you decide to do as a career.”

Peter grew up off the Cregagh Road in east Belfast, in a family whose interests lay not in singing, but brass band music – his father played in a brass band and his brother conducts a brass band. And, in his younger days, Peter played the euphonium (a baby tuba), the French Horn and the cornet, but admits he “enjoyed singing more.”

Peter’s father is 94 and his mother is 89 and they are immensely proud of their talented son. “When my mum goes to my concerts, she will say to me afterwards, ‘so I was just talking to somebody and it just came up in conversation that I was your mother’,” he laughs.

His first public singing appearance was in a rock group in church.

“I would have been around the age of 16 when I first thought, gosh, I can sing.” Acknowledging that was a relatively late age to find his voice, it wasn’t conventional arias he was initially drawn to, but Meat Loaf’s big, bombastic, operatic heavy rock and vocal pyrotechnics.

Peter now lives in Greyabbey with his wife Fleur Mellor, a choreographer, theatre producer and wedding celebrant – and the new love in his life, Raisin, a very cute brown and black cat.

“The biggest thing in my life recently has been the cat – we've been totally besotted with her. I love dogs, but having a cat is like a whole new world.

"A dog is predictable, it's loyal, it sticks by you, with a cat you don’t known were you stand from one minute to the next. But she is such a cutie."

As well as being a seasoned singer, director, producer and actor, Peter is also the artistic director for the Belfast School of Performing Arts.

"That is going going from strength to strength. We're up to 900 pupils and 11 schools throughout Northern Ireland."

His company, Peter Corry Productions, is also busy delivering exceptional corporate entertainment.

"It's something that we've wanted to develop over the last five years and even through the pandemic we managed to do it.

" It's a company that's run by myself and my wife and we're thrilled with where it is, the clients we've got and the standard of the corporate entertainment we're able to put on over here, something which, and I say this modestly, hasn't really been available from a Northern Ireland company for Northern Ireland companies.

“The big thing with us is about the excitement and quality we bring to something when we do a production for a company or for for a council, or whatever. And we've we've been delighted with how it’s going.”

Peter has performed all over the world, but perhaps the most unusual place was Inner Mongolia.

“It was such an experience to go there. I remember finishing the first night and the producer came up to me and said would I like you to sing another song the following night.

"I thought he was gonna say something like Danny Boy, but he played this Chinese song for me and I sat and learned that song phonetically and got up the next night and did it in front of about 5,000 people and the place erupted.

"I’m sure I mispronounced quite a lot of it, but the fact that I'd made the effort to do it it really can get an audience on your side.”

So, does this consummate professional ever forget the words (whatever language he’s singing in)?

“Thankfully, it doesn't happen too often. But I'm really good at making words up. I’m even happier if I can make them rhyme. I take a perverted satisfaction out of it."

And after three decades in the industry, he says he doesn’t really get nervous before a performance.

“I still get excited. I still get that buzz. It’s a feeling that I love. I'm very lucky that after 30 years of doing this I'm as happy and content as I’ve ever been.”

To book tickets for Thank You for the Musicals visit www.petercorryproductions.com