By Mark Gregory
Sports Editor
@Hear_The_Beard
mark@buglenewspapers.com
For many people, their job is just what they do to pay the bills as they count down the days to retirement.
For Engelbert Humperdinck it is much more.
The 81-year-old s “Release Me” and “The Last Waltz” singer celebrated his 50th anniversary of his first international chart success last year by releasing a new album.
Humperdinck will bring songs from that album and his other mega hits to Joliet’s Rialto Square Theater on Saturday, April 21.
“I love what I do,” Humperdinck said. “This year is a continuation of my 50th year in the business and we are celebrating. Last year we did a box set of 11 CDs that was the first seven years of my career and this year we released a brand new album called “’The Man I Want To Be” because I still don’t know who I want to be and I have been in the business 50 years.
“It is an amazing album and has some fantastic new songs which I am thrilled about. This album is a love letter to my wife.”
The new album features new material as well as covers of songs like Photograph” by Ed Sheeran, and “Just The Way You Are” by Bruno Mars.
Mars is an artist that Humperdinck knew of long before the rest of the world.
“He performed for me in Hawaii when the fan club had a party for me and he was only five years old and I told him then he was going to be a big star – but now he is a mega star and now I am recording one of his songs,” Humperdinck said. “It is amazing how our paths have crossed again. I just hope he likes my rendition. I got a great note from Richard Marx thanking me for recording one of his songs.”
The covers, however, are not the songs that help make the album personal to the 81-year-old father of four.
He performs a duet on the album with his granddaughter Oliva.
“There is a song called “I’m Glad I Danced With You,” it is the only duet on the album and it is sung by my granddaughter who is nine years old,” Humperdinck said. “She is wonderful. She is family, but I wouldn’t have put her on the album if she wasn’t wonderful.”
The new material and an all new show is something fans can expect April 21 when Humperdinck arrives in downtown Joliet.
“I always give them something different,” he said. “I try and keep my show fresh when I play a place I have visited before. I never take a break, I am on stage one hour and 45 minutes and I try and keep fans interested.”