Michael Ball performing his Coming Home To You Tour at The Royal Concert Hall on Saturday 20th April 2019.


Images and Review by Kevin Cooper

There wasn’t a seat to be had at the Royal Concert Hall last night when Michael Ball came to town on the first night of his UK tour, which saw a giant screen, a very talented eight piece band, three backing singers and of course the cheeky chappie himself, whose genuine warmth and charisma charmed this audience from the off.

Touring to promote his latest solo album, Coming Home To You, he started the evening with the self penned title track before giving Elvis Presley’s I Just Can’t Help Believin’ the Michael Ball treatment. Other album tracks such as I Have To Say I Love You In A Song, Sail On and Lost Without You were very well received, as his superb voice never wavered.

And when this West End and Broadway titan treated his faithful fans to Sweeney Todd’s Not While I’m Around, Evermore from Beauty And The Beast, and I Won’t Send Roses from Mac And Mabel, this audience was sent to musical heaven.

A sublime version of Bright Eyes was followed by Tell Me It’s Not True from the musical Blood Brothers which saw the Hall swathed in beautiful red lights before he got his first standing ovation of the evening for the wonderful Anthem from Chess.

For the second half Ball continued where he had left off with new song Tennessee Dreams, his version of The Bee Gees’ To Love Somebody and the dreamy Cliff Richard’s Miss You Nights. But it was the Les Misérables medley that brought everyone to their feet again as Ball’s voice filled the auditorium with the likes of Empty Chairs At Empty Tables, I Dreamed A Dream and Stars before he finished with a high energy display of You Can’t Stop The Beat performed with the same vigour as when he first played Edna Turnball in Hairspray over twelve years ago.

Bringing the set to a close with his trademark song, Love Changes Everything, and Elvis Presley’s The Wonder Of You, Ball with his perennial twinkle in his eye showed just why he has become a bit of a national treasure.