Clay Aiken – The Midway Point

Clay Aiken and his group of fabulous musicians shined brightly Wednesday night as they performed at the Blumenthal PAC in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Clay must have felt right at home as he stepped on the stage and saw the many familiar and friendly faces in the audience.  Among the audience were Clay’s mother and Grandmother, Diane and Emma Bubel, and even a long time school chum named Audra.  She was introduced to us in Clay’s book, ”Learning To Sing”.   Among the full auditorium, there were many friends, old and new, and fans from throughout the country.

The Charlotte concert marks the midway point of the Tried and True concert.  The 22-city tour closes on March 12th in San Francisco, California.


On Wednesday, there was another group of wonderful articles about Clay and the Tried & True Tour.  Each one was positive and even though the headline was written to attract attention (as it should), had nothing but praise for Clay and his music

James Grant is a feature writer for Fort Wayne.com.  This is a part of the News-Sentinel in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  James conducted a wonderful telephone interview with Clay about his up-coming concert on March 2nd, at the Embassy Theatre in Fort Wayne.  Clay talked about the PBS special that was filmed last March.

“We’re doing it a little bit differently from the PBS special, just to kind of give us some flexibility in the music we do, … (and) the order we do it in,” Aiken said in a telephone interview.

“The PBS special was such a big production itself; in order to take that on the road, you kind of lose some of the intimacy that I like to have in the show … . It’s the same vibe, it’s the same sound, but it’s not going to look exactly the same.”

While the PBS concert was a big production, more important to Aiken was the fact the show was shot in his hometown of Raleigh, N.C., in front of family, friends and people who made an impact on his life.

“I had about 15 to 20 teachers who had taught me at various grades all the way from second grade up to senior year, college actually,” Aiken said. “I had one teacher from every grade except for first and kindergarten who were at the show. That was probably the neatest thing, to be able to do it (the PBS concert) in the theater that I grew up seeing shows in and had not performed in before or had not performed in since ‘Idol’ at all.”

Please visit the article by Mr. Grant and the entire article.  He has also included a link to the phone interview with Clay.  You can read the article at FORTWAYNE.COM


WCNC is News Channel 36, a television station in Charlotte, North Carolina.  Clay appeared in station for a live interview.  The hosts had met and interviewed when he was first on American Idol and seemed to enjoy the conversation with Clay.  The headline is “It’s None of Your Business” as Clay addressed his decision to come out on People Magazine.

“I wasn’t in the closet before,” he said. “I was out to friends here in Charlotte; I was out to pretty much everyone I knew. I feel like there’s a little bit of hypocrisy there. People who are gay who live in Charlotte, who live anywhere else, they don’t have to come out to the world. And I didn’t either. People knew, I had told my family, I’d told friends, people knew but I had not told ‘you’ and it’s none of your business.”

Please visit this wonderful site.  They have the written article, a video of the interview and a great slide show.  You can see this at WCNC


ExploreLI is a part of Newsday, Long Island.  Glenn Gamboa wrote about his interview with Clay.  The Tried and True Tour will make a stop on Long Island on Saturday, February 26th.  The concert will be held at the NYCB Theatre in Westbury, Long Island.

Clay talked on many subjects including his stint on American Idol, his involvement in GLSEN, and his choice of music.  About the record industry, Clay said:

The industry is more interested in immediate hits rather than careers that last.

The music industry has certainly changed.

It’s in the process of reinventing itself and we have to look at things in a different way. A few years ago, you had to have a major label behind you. Now, it doesn’t necessarily behoove you to have one…. just won the Grammy for Album of the Year and they’re on a tiny, tiny label in Durham, near where I’m from and that’s not exactly a music industry Mecca. With everything changing so fast, I don’t think it’s a good idea to be in a long-term deal. It restricts you.

Please visit EXPLORELI and read the entire article by Glenn.  It is an interesting read.

Isn’t it wonderful to read all the interesting articles and interviews about Clay Aiken?  I hope there are many more in the next week.

Today is Greenville, South Carolina.  So, any guesses on which sweater Clay will wear?

Clay Aiken News Network is an unofficial fansite. We are not affiliated in any way with Clay Aiken or his management. This website was made by fans for fans and makes no impression or impersonation of the official site, which can be found under the domain clayaiken.com.

5 thoughts on “Clay Aiken – The Midway Point

  1. Thanks so much. Love hearing his voice on the interviews and love that he is being interviewed before each concert.

    Cannot believe he is at the midpoint already. Glad I got to see one of the concerts. Thanks to sites like this I get to see more and relive mine.

    Clay Aiken has been at the top of his game for this tour–wouldn't have missed it for anything.

  2. Love the interviews. Most of these are good questions…….Thank goodness we seem to be beyond AI questions!!

    Thanks for posting all these articles.

  3. Love all the interviews. This time around the interviews are all positive and respectful. What a relief! I especially like the Charlotte Ch36 interview. I just got through watching it again. I am so glad I got to see Clay in Orlando. Great show…wish I could go to more. Clay just keeps getting better and better in each subsequent show. He is quite the entertainer.

  4. Thanks for bringing us news of Clay from many different sites and footage of the concerts. Each concert has something special and different from the one that I saw in Cleveland. I hope someday that Clay will produce a DVD of one of his concerts (like Tried & True in Raleigh) so we can enjoy them over and over again.

  5. I will add to the thank you CANN, for all you do. Love all the info so we can be as supportive to Clay as possible.

    Counting down still 🙂 EEE!!!!

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