By: Kindah Mardam Bey 

My Grandfather would have loved Paul Potts. Every Sunday of my formative years I spent at the knee of my working-class Grandfather learning about Opera and Classical Music. It was the stories of regular people with extraordinary skills that always fascinated my Grandfather, and he would have loved cell phone warehouse manager Paul Potts who won Britain’s Got Talent this year and is now taking the world by storm with an opera classic. Pavarotti, Carreras, Caruso, Domingo, Mario Lanza, the Three Tenors, the Ten Tenors, all of operas male singers have contributed their voices to Puccini’s classic Nessun Dorma.  

Yet, Paul Potts took centre stage on the first Britain’s Got Talent TV Show (akin to Pop Idol and American Idol), stood in front of scathing critic Simon Cowell (scathing only if you think you can sing but really can’t, and are fooling no one but yourself) and a live audience where he belted out in clear perfection Nessun Dorma to the rafters. Gran’s cried, young girls wept, the audience sprang to their feet in ovation and Simon Cowell called Potts ‘fantastic.’ That was it; Paul Potts ‘had us at hello.’  

It got a lot better then that though, as Paul Potts took the stage for a few more rounds of BGT we learned of his love for Opera and how being bullied at school drove him to the shores of Wales where he would sing to the ocean. Unbeknownst to Potts, he was training his lungs for the Acropolis when he was singing into the wind.  He took hardship and made music out of it. Paul Potts voice heralds back to the time of Mario Lanza where Opera was sung with less technique then the skill set of Pavarotti, but with more passion and emotion. In truth, Potts is not the debonair polished Machiavellian Prince’s of classical singing group Il Divo, but he seems to manage rendering women into a swoon with his vocals and sweetness. Like Rosie O’Donnell wanting Tom Cruise to mow her lawn, we want Paul Potts to sing to us while we do a sink full of dishes. 

An easily managed feat apparently as Simon Cowell’s first comment to Potts after his win of BGT was a call to the recording studio. Potts was in debt after a series of unfortunate accidents, and health problems; so the 100,000 British Pounds win seemed like a blessing until he was offered a 1,000,000 Pound contract for his first album by Cowell. Potts agreed, and four months later, this amateur virtuoso has become a bonafide contender into the world of Opera and classical- contemporary music taking the world by storm within the same category as Josh Groban, Il Divo, and The Celtic Tenors to name a few.  

What Simon Cowell saw every time he watched Potts perform onstage was that ‘it factor’ he’s always going on about; that palpable pheromone that audiences are drawn to and producers like Cowell find dollar signs in. Paul Potts is bringing the passion and caring back to audiences towards the realm of Opera. After all, if Potts can breathe life into something so over sung as Nessun Dorma (it’s as dangerous an audition piece as Somewhere Over The Rainbow) then can you imagine what he’ll do to the other classics as Music Of The Night, Caruso or You Raise Me Up?  

Well, now you can, and you can also listen to Potts while you do dishes, as his debut album was released on September 18^th, 2007; One Chance is picking up speed and wide acclaim for its simplicity and beauty.  

At 36, Paul Potts life has just got started and he’s being blindsided with fame. Topping the YouTube ‘most viewed’ video for weeks, Potts has become a much talked about ‘buzz’ within the internet where his fame is growing and fan sites are already popping into existence. One better, Potts has performed in front of his Queen and recently featured on Oprah. Potts can live a life that few do, where he has learned that even though those school bullies may have seen a frog, many have now discovered a prince. 

To learn more about Paul Potts, you can go to his official website: click here

A Great Fansite: Paul Potts Opera! click here

Or to purchase his CD One Chance from Amazon: click here