Walking in the Air: Aled Jones on the Christmas song that changed his life
Aled Jones: has maintained a lifelong love of music.
It is very fitting that the boy in Bobby Dean Saves Christmas realises he has magical powers when he sings, but Aled Jones, famous for his own singing particularly when he was young (he joined the choir of Bangor Cathedral at age nine, quickly becoming a lead soloist before a certain song catapulted him into the public domain), insists he isn’t based on himself. “I had the idea about this boy who sang when he got nervous or scared. And it's not me really, it's probably more my son he’s based on as he had a lovely voice when he was younger,” said Aled of the book’s main character.
“But music has always been in our house especially with the kids growing up (Aled has two children) and during lockdown all my live concerts went out the window. And I’d written a book last year called Blessings for Hodder and said to my editor that I had an idea that I'd like to write this story about this boy who had been homeschooled for first of nine years of his life, and then decides he wants to go to school to make friends – and that’s how it all started.”
The book is a perfect stocking filler for young children this Christmas (and the first in a series of three) with a story that’s fun, engaging with beautiful illustrations by Rosie Brooks, and it’s the link to the singing that provides the personal link which really gives the first book its charm. Aled says he had to “learn how to really write for children” over a process that took months, but agrees the initial plot was the easiest to conjure up.
“I've always used music, I think many people have, for different things. If you're worried you put music on, if you're scared you might put music on or if you're depressed or happy you put music on. Music has always been central to my life and it's central to Bobby's as well. He just uses it as a mechanism to allay those fears if you like,so it's a way of the real world dissolving and him going on these bonkers adventures but what I tried to do with mine is marry the craziness with also the reality. So his life on the farm is very simplistic, mum overcooks the food, the dog’s always there by his side, so it's a safe environment as well. But then when he goes off on these adventures, it’s anything but.”
His own relationship to what is one of the most famous pieces of music ever written has changed as he’s grown up and his own career has progressed, he says. Aled sky-rocketed (quite literally, you might say) to fame at just 12-years-old with his cover version of Walking in the Air, the song from Channel 4's animated film The Snowman, based on the book by Raymond Briggs. The track, which he originally recorded for a Toys R Us ad, reached the Top Ten in the UK charts in 1985. For those that don’t know, the version used in the 1982 film was performed by Peter Auty, a St. Paul's Cathedral choir boy, and not Aled, though you’ll still find an article or two which has the error.
Aled stopped singing temporarily at 16 when his voice broke, having sold millions of records up to that point, and explains that it took a while for his love of it to return.
“When my voice changed, I stopped singing of course. And I went off to college and I was very lucky to get the lead in the Joseph musical, the biggest musical in the world on tour at the time, straight out of college. Every night there were standing ovations, but I didn’t really enjoy the singing because it felt more like a technical thing than a love thing. Actually, the love of singing came back slowly but surely when I joined Songs of Praise and started singing the hymns and the music I've done all my life. Everything seemed to kind of click into place. And I'm not going to kid anyone. I'm at my happiest when I'm doing the music that I do. That's what I love. I've tried albums where I've been doing more poppy music and stuff like that. But I think I should just stick to the day job!”
And given that Walking in the Air is, to this day, the song he is still so known for, does he still love the song the way he once did? For so many, the song is an integral part of Christmas, and Aled says he’s grown to appreciate it more as the years have passed.
"You know what, there's no getting away from it,” he continues, laughing. “I'm very lucky in fact that there were years where I wasn't doing anything except Christmas when Walking in the Air would come around again. So for that, I was very grateful. And when I went into the studio to record the advert for Toys R Us, I never thought that that would become the Christmas hit that would be here forever. And it was actually one of the hardest tracks to record. I don't know why I thought that I’d only have to learn the 30 seconds I was supposed to do for the finished recording, but we recorded the whole thing and thank goodness we did. It's an integral part of Christmas now. And, you know, if I had a problem with it, I'd have a huge problem, because it's played everywhere!”
When it comes to his own Christmas celebrations, Aled says there are no renditions of the track in front of family - “definitely not!” - more a traditional affair.
“I have a traditional Christmas, it's always with family and having quality time together, especially this year, when we've been apart so much because of COVID. So I can't wait to just close the front door and just be with my loved ones. I tend to do the same sort of things. I am the Vice President of a charity in London called Story of Christmas, which is nine lessons and carols with actors, the calibre of Judi Dench, and people like that. And the band of the Irish Guards, at the Cathedral. And that's always the start of Christmas, for me. I narrate it every year, and I sit in the choir stalls and hear them singing this beautiful music and you can't help but feel the warmth of it.”
- Bobby Dean Saves Christmas by Aled Jones, illustrated by Rosie Brooks (Hodder & Stoughton, €9.99) is out now.
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