‘I miss Tyrone so much’ (From The Northern Echo)

‘I miss Tyrone so much’

10:25am Friday 4th December 2009

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BRITISH soul diva Beverley Knight lives to sing, but there was a time when even music could not fill a massive hole in her life.

Immediately following the death of her friend, Tyrone Jamison, six years ago from Aids, she couldn’t even listen to music for six months.

“I still miss him every day,” she says. “We became best friends within days of meeting, and although he was gay and our relationship was platonic, it was so close and we were perfectly in tune with each other. He was my soulmate.

“When he died it was the lowest I’ve ever been in my life, and listening to anything brought back too many memories. It was just too painful. It was the only time in my life that I had to cut myself off from what drives me.”

She helped nurse Tyrone through the final stages of the illness, was with him when he died, and he’s been her inspiration for her work with charities such as Christian Aid.

She’s supporting the charity’s Big Christmas Sing, a campaign from December 11 to 13 encouraging people to get together and sing as a fundraising effort to raise £100,000 to help people who live in poverty around the world.

“Because of what I experienced with Tyrone I’m concerned that there’s still far too much apathy and complacency about HIV, especially among young people here,” she says.

“There’s this false notion that if you become HIV positive you just take the anti-retroviral drugs and you’ll completely recover. Wrong.

Tyrone was taking those and he died. So I try to raise awareness of HIV/Aids through my charity work.”

But Beverley also hopes the Big Sing will turn people on to the positive effects of singing and getting together with others to enjoy music.

“I hope that people who’ve never thought of singing before can experience the sheer fun of it and realise that it has such an amazing effect on your spirits and can literally raise your energy levels.

“Let’s face it, it’s impossible not to feel a lift after belting out a few songs, even if it’s just with some pals and a karaoke machine or doing a bit of carol singing. But I warn them, once you get the passion for singing, it’s totally addictive.”

■ To find out more and hold a Big Christmas Sing, register with Christian Aid for a free fundraising pack, which includes guidelines, tips, a poster and donation form. Call 020-7523-2248 or see christianaid.org.uk/bigsing

Strictly keeping fit

AS the Strictly Come Dancing competition gets into the final run, BitterSweet Partnership have calculated the fun way to burn off the calories women might consume during a girlie Saturday night in watching the TV.

We have pulled together a table of different options that women might drink and calculated the time it would take to burn it off on the dancefloor.

■ One glass of white wine equals 42 minutes of disco dancing

■ One bottle of lager equals 29 minutes of the twist

■ One gin and tonic equals 1 hour 13 minutes of waltz

Perhaps surprisingly, beer is the quickest alcoholic beverage to dance off. Just 29 minutes of twisting will burn off a bottle of beer, while wine lovers will need to take to the dance floor for nearly ten minutes longer.

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