Quick Q&A: Euan Morton

photo: Joan Marcus

I talked very briefly with Euan Morton about his upcoming gigs at The Metropolitan Room and Castle On The Hudson.

What do you do when you are not on stage in New York?

Mostly I do singing concerts – corporate, private, sometimes ones in theatres, like the Huntington Stage in Boston, Center Stage in Baltimore….I’ve just come back from singing in The Bahamas. Sometimes I do plays, depending on what is available really.

Why haven’t you done a musical in New York since Taboo?

I want to try something new all the time, I don’t just want to repeat myself. I always have music available to me because I can do concerts, like the ones coming up this month. It just so happens that plays have come my way and they’ve been interesting and diverse so I’ve jumped at the chance to do them. I didn’t train in musical theatre. I fell in to it, really. In London I did Shakespeare and Chekhov. So musical theatre was a sideline anyway, although I’ve really enjoyed it and I’d love to do another one. I’ve been working on a couple of workshops that hopefully will have some life in the future.

Does one of those workshops happen to be Caligula?

Yes it does! We’re going back to do a workshop with a new script at the beginning of July. They’ve assembled a nice team. Of course it all depends on the way of the world when trying to spend millions on a Broadway show. It’s a great piece, it’s been around for a few years now. It was scheduled to be done immediately after its run at the New York Musical Theatre Festival but unfortunately the producer at the time just couldn’t get it together. Lots of fingers seem to be pointed at him – it’s kind of crazy how people will look for someone to blame when things don’t work out, isn’t it.

Boy George once likened your voice to Karen Carpenter’s. Is that valid?

That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about me. I was always a big Carpenters fan when I was a kid because my mum used to listen to them all the time. I would sing along with the vinyl records and try to do Karen’s technique and her breathing. I never had singing lessons, I always used to say that Karen Carpenter was my singing teacher. To have someone recognize that I copied her was great.

How did you choose the songs for your album New Clear?

You know, I could have called that album “Songs I Sing In The Shower”, which is what those songs are and why the album is so diverse. I wanted the first album to be things I enjoyed and the songs are from all over the spectrum. The label, Lyric Partners, used to refer to a first album as your hairball, you just kind of want to get it out and you never have to do it again.

What will you be singing apart from the songs on the album at these upcoming gigs?

The Castle On The Hudson show is gonna be along the lines of what I used to do at the Zipper Theatre. It’ll be a cabaret set, the piano and I, but with more of the pop and rock influence. Less like The Algonquuin, more like Joe’s Pub. Although I haven’t actually set the set list yet.

The Metropolitan Room gigs are actually quite different. I’m doing them because this year is the 250th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns, this Scottish poet lauraete e who wrote “Auld Lang Syne”. He’s very famous back in Scotland. We’re celebrating with parties all over the world and calling it The Year Of The Homecoming. It’s about Scottish people celebrating being Celtic. That’s the reason I’m hosting this event at the Metropolitan Room and singing Scottish folk music. They’ll also be some modern things – Annie Lennox, modern Scotttish writers. It’s a great theme to play with….who knew there were that many great Scottish songs?