LITTLE VOICE

I know that many other people have dreamed of this success for many years, and to be able to accomplish it at such a young age is just so honouring, really .

Thus spake Rhode Island s answer to Garth Brooks and Jim n Tammy Bakker all rolled into one. Billy Gilman may only be 4 11 and 12 years old, but he s big in Nashville, and promises to be even bigger in Japan later.
With one album, One Voice, already on release and another Christmas special hitting the racks just in time for the extended U.S. festive season, this is no cockamamie crooner from the sticks hoping to make a couple of bucks. Billy Gilman has been washed, ironed and starched in preparation for his inevitable superstardom at home and away, if Sony, his record company has anything to do with it.
Gilman is a mind-boggling mix of wide-eyed innocent and deeply earnest interpreter of Big Songs with Big Lyrics.
There are a lot of sacrifices , he offers glumly, in detailing life on the road. Although it may not be full of Kerouacian excess, it still comes with its irks: like, you don t see your family much, and you can t eat candy before you go on, but other than that it s really really fun.
Gilman s wasted little time in honing his PR skills. Some might describe him as precocious, but street smart might be even more accurate.
Next year, I m doing a really big tour , he enthuses, backed up by an equally enthusiastic grin, and I hope to come to Ireland cos I love it so much. It ll be really fun!
At a time when most pre-pubescents heroes are Pokemon and Bart Simpson, Gilman s list is a little to the right of his peers rebellious role models.
I love all the legends , he offers with characteristic ebullience, displayed in equal measure when ordering bottled water, talking about video games and embarking on world tours. Patsy Cline, Pam Tillis, Shania Twain. All of the big country acts. I just love it. It s my music.
With four Billboard awards already in the bag (two Contemporary Christian Awards, Top New Artist in Country Music and Jazz/AC Award an eclectic mix), Billy Gilman is intent on pleasing as many people as he possibly can, all of the time.
He tries not to let his globetrotting lifestyle get in the way of life s fundamentals, though. Fitting in girlfriends is possible, with the right time-management skills, of course.
Well, I had a girlfriend when I was in 5th grade , he offers, in all seriousness, but then we were apart so much, we split up. So I m single at the moment
It s not often that I get to interview somebody who s smaller than myself (5 feet and counting), but listening to this wide-eyed 12-year-old talk of world tours, hotel rooms and performing in the Grand Old Opry, it s hard not to imagine an Ethel Gumm (Judy Garland s quintessential showbiz mother from hell) cranking the adding machine in the backroom.
Two women well versed in the finer points of music management head up his entourage. Ellie Warnick, Gilman s tour manager, and Angela Bacari, his vocal coach and on-the-road guardian, can t help but betray a road weariness that comes of six months incessant touring.
I work directly for Billy , Ellie offers, and I m the only person besides his management that works directly for him, so my only goal is to see that what s in his best interest happens. I m solely devoted to him and what he needs. It s a big job!
Warnick claims a greater kinship with her current job spec than with previous eh, charges .
Most adult artists are kids themselves , she laughs shrilly. The only difference now, is that instead of hanging out in bars, I get to go to Disney Quest and I get to do nice things, fun things! I don t have to worry about what he s doing at night. I know he s watching a movie or something like that. So it s been like a re-awakening for me, kinda like a new faith for me.
Bacari s role focuses on that larger-than-the-lad Gilman s voice, and ensuring it survives the vicissitudes of life on the road and in the studio.
Billy was brought to me four years ago , she says, so I trained him vocally, and trained him in every way. Now, I m part managing him, along with my partner who s based in Nashville. I travel with him all the time, and I act as his guardian and his disciplinarian. It helps that Ellie s on my same page when it comes to managing situations.
Billy s debut, One Voice, is a collection of quite adult songs, including one entitled Spend Another Night . Asking a 12-year-old to tackle such subjects causes little anxiety in the Gilman camp.
We all have a part in picking the songs, the lyrics appropriate to Billy, that would be believable on the radio. Yes, some things have love lyrics, things that he couldn t possibly relate to, but we really watch that, especially on his CD, where it s more of a boy/girl thing, not man and woman I think.
Gilman sinks into the stuffed sofas of plush hotel lobbies with far greater ease than either Bacari or Warnick. Right now, their goal is to get through the tour schedule and head for home, albeit for a brief stopover.
It s been a life commitment , Bacari acknowledges. And that s how it s gonna be until Billy s old enough to do it himself, maybe when he s 18! Right now, I m just looking forward to walking around the rooms of my own house, and not sleeping in a hotel room for a couple of nights.
Burn out? If anybody s to burn out, it s far less likely to be Billy than it is his entourage. I get up to leave. He jumps up and hugs me. His indomitable willingness to please inevitably poses a nagging question: when everybody in the whole wide world is your friend, how do you know who to play your video games with?