The West End star has collaborated again with long-term creative partner Sir Brian May – this time, on an album with a suitably royal twist
KERRY ELLIS
After collaborating for two decades, West End superstar Kerry Ellis and Queen icon Sir Brian May have built quite the friendship – so much so that Kerry’s two young sons have come to know the legendary rocker simply as “Uncle Brian”. “They’ve grown up with him,” says Kerry, who met the Queen guitarist in 2001, years before becoming mum to Alfie, nine, and Freddie, seven, the children she shares with husband James Townsend.
“If they hear a song on the radio, they’ll say: ‘Oh, that’s Uncle Brian,’ but I don’t think they quite realise the magnitude of who he is yet. At some point, they’ll be like: ‘Oh my God, I used to go on a tour bus with that guy.’”
It has been over two decades since the start of Kerry’s fruitful partnership with Sir Brian, who was knighted by the King in March and famously took to the roof of Buckingham Palace to perform the national anthem as part of the celebrations for the Golden Jubilee in 2002.
One year earlier, the musician was so enamoured by Kerry’s understudy performance as My Fair Lady’s Eliza Doolittle that he invited her to audition to play Meat in the Queen musical We Will Rock You, a role she held for two years.
Having worked together on several albums and tours, they have teamed up once more for a project with a royal twist: Sir Brian’s guitar-playing features on Kerry’s new album, Kings and Queens, which pays a fond tribute to our new monarch.
“It felt like a really nice little appreciation,” the star says. She performed for – and met – the then Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall at the Royal Variety Performance in 2008, as well as singing for the Queen at the Festival of Remembrance in 2010 and at garden parties at the palace.
“I have had brilliant interactions with the royals over the years,” says Kerry, who performed alongside Sir Brian at the Royal Variety Performance, singing Defying Gravity from the musical Wicked, in which she starred in the West End and on Broadway. “Charles came over and said: ‘Brilliant performance – what a wonderful, powerful voice you have.’ They were very sweet.”
ROYAL SEAL OF APPROVAL
The star – who has played some of musical theatre’s most famous characters, from Nancy in Oliver! to Fantine in Les Misérables – has shared her admiration for the royals with her sons, taking them
