Mead’s Phantom concert delayed

Published Monday 7 April 2008 at 17:00 by Matthew Hemley

Plans for a concert performance of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall, in which Lee Mead was scheduled to take a starring role, have been put on hold.

The concert, organised by BBC Radio 2, was being lined up to coincide with Lloyd Webber’s 60th birthday this year and was expected to include Mead as Raoul and American pop star Josh Groban as the Phantom.

However, it will not now go ahead as planned this year because Lloyd Webber is too busy with his other commitments.

Instead, it is understood that the proposal will be looked at again in the next year or so.

A spokeswoman for Lloyd Webber said: “The Phantom concert is a great idea but it is proving impossible this year, so we will revisit it in the future. Andrew is working on a sequel to The Phantom of the Opera as well as his Oliver search on the BBC, so his diary is chocka. With something at the Albert Hall, you can’t organise it at the drop of a hat.”

A spokeswoman for BBC Radio 2 declined to comment.