An Evening with Col Coleman
at the LA Hotel
by Margaret Sheard…..
Having never actually seen Col Coleman perform before, we went along to the LA Hotel in Lapta where he was giving one of his regular performances for the hotel guests. When we arrived we met Col’s wife Maha and their so cute little daughter Lilly-Mai and shared a table with them for the rest of the evening.
Col’s music is very easy listening and he sang many good old time favourites which I am sure the diners enjoyed while having their evening meal and as we hadn’t eaten we decided to have a meal as well and made our choice from the very nice buffet selection, accompanied by Lilly-Mai who insisted on coming with us to help us choose.
We were very impressed with Col’s performance, he has a good voice and even being asked to sing a Beatles golden oldie by one of the audience he did this really well, although he said he doesn’t do the Beatles and had never actually sung the particular song before, but it went down very well with the group of 4 people, who were holidaymakers from Hungary. They were very taken with Lilly-Mai who joined them while they were playing cards and they seemed to really enjoy her company. She is such a little cutie and so pretty, of course Col absolutely dotes on her which is not surprising.
Col brought his family to North Cyprus in 2013, his wife Maha is Egyptian and is from Luxor where she met Col and where they married 6 years ago. Lilly-Mai was born in Luxor in 2012 and had her 3rd birthday here in North Cyprus on 9th September. In fact it was Maha’s birthday that day, the 19th September. Lilly-Mai chatters away and Maha said she is starting to speak Arabic, English and now some Turkish so as she grows older she will put us to shame with 3 languages!
Originally from England, Col Coleman is a lively character with a great sense of humour and he loves music and entertaining. Although of English origin, Col spent most of his life in Egypt before making the move to North Cyprus where he joined ASAP to be a legal entertainer. Whilst in Egypt, Col was lucky enough to perform with a variety of musicians and known acts, primarily the bands ‘The Usual Suspects’ and ‘Old Heads Young Shoulders’ in addition to being a member of the first band ever allowed to play at the Luxor Temple with guest vocalist Michelle Rounds.
Playing in bands in Egypt as guitarist and vocalist, Col could be found three times a week in popular JJ’s Bar and made such an impression he is featured in travel reviews. In North Cyprus, Col set up as a solo artist and is able to play ‘everything’ to suit the audience. Col’s primary love is Blues and Rock although he will incorporate everything from Jazz, Country and Rock and the occasional ballad as well to give variety to the performance.
We had a very nice evening at the LA Hotel, listening to Col and spending some time with his lovely wife and daughter and we hope to do this again in the near future.
