I learned a lot from my parents about loving your children, treating them with respect and allowing them a voice. Our religion teaches that we are bonded together in eternity, so relationships are very respectful.
We value kindness and forgiveness. Debbie and I are religious but not over-fanatical so we have a firm respect for deity, which holds true in our home. I based my parenting style on my dad at first, whom I grew very close to over the years.
I think I lightened up as a dad as time went on. Debbie and I have been together nearly 39 years. We have this saying: whenever there is an argument she is always right! She also says that we had five boys but she raised six — and she is still raising me! Family has always been the core of my life. Four of our sons are now grown and we have eight grandchildren. We all make an effort to have weekends together as a family as often as we can. The singer on growing up in a religious show-business family, lightening up as a dad and being married for 39 years.
Think soccer games, birthday parties, that sort of thing. The next Tuesday, he would start it all over again. He tells me he built a waterfall and a fire pit and planted one fruit tree for each of his grandkids. So after talking in his den for more than an hour, we move to the kitchen, where he pours two glasses of iced grape juice.
Elvis, Prince, Michael Jackson. Donny and Michael Jackson were on similar paths for a while. They were around the same age, both the young stars of their respective family bands, both successful solo artists. When they talked, though, Donny got the impression that his friend was actually jealous of him.
He says it was the same way with Elvis and Prince. He remembers them wanting to talk about family, too. He just sits there, beaming at me.
A short gravel road winds past a dozen fruit trees, each labeled with a type of fruit and the name of a grandkid. Most of the area is invisible to the outside world. As we get to the chairs around the fire pit he tells me to sit down. He pulls out his phone and swipes at the screen a bit, then he looks up.
Suddenly I hear the trickle of water pouring over boulders. He explains that he personally wired the waterfall to an app on his phone. And it will just take you away from the important things. When he feels himself drifting too far, he comes here. He cuts some grass. He prunes some trees. He turns on his waterfall and listens.
He says he was self-conscious about so many things for so many years. He only went to school for two weeks in the second grade, then two weeks in sixth grade, then one semester at BYU.
More than the education though, he was self-conscious about his peers. Although by then, some had begun bringing boyfriends and husbands to his concerts. He assumed they were all being dragged to the show and hated it. He had the same mentality when he started the residency in Las Vegas in Most of the time, by the end of the night, those men are dancing and swaying with everyone else in the room.
I ask him why he and Marie decided to stop their show at the Flamingo. They were still one of the most coveted tickets in Las Vegas, even after 11 years. Donny says that Marie wanted to do it for another year.
He just felt like it was time for another reinvention. The night before he made the announcement about the new show, he called Marie to make sure she knew. He says she told him that she wants to be in the front row on opening night. After talking for a while, Donny wants me to listen to a few tracks from his new album, several of which will also be part of his new show.
Inside the office near the front of his house, he has a telephone booth-sized recording studio, insulated with thick soundproofing on all sides. Several tracks could play on any pop station in America right now. He shows me a swatch of a new kind of purple paint that will apparently illuminate on its own, lighting the entire room at some point during the performance.
The purple paint is just one of the hints he gives me about the new solo show. Tear ducts everywhere spilling forth. Though now his sandbox is huge and has a waterfall he controls with his phone.
Donny is also still that hopeful kid who grew up in a house full of music and wanted nothing more than to entertain whoever was in front of him. Until he has to force himself to step back and focus on the only thing more important. By midafternoon, Debbie is home and their third son, Brandon, has come over with his sons Peder and Benson.
Initially the group sang barbershop quartet style harmonies on religious material, but they later incorporated more popular tunes into their performances. He served as the lead vocalist on many of the group's tracks, including their first big hit, "One Bad Apple," which spent five weeks at the top of the pop charts in Then, billing themselves as the Osmonds, they had several more hits, including "Down by the Lazy River" and "Crazy Horses.
The popularity of the Osmonds eventually began to fade, though Donny went on to collaborate with sole sister Marie to great success.
Marie was "a little bit country" while Donny was "a little bit rock 'n' roll," according to the lyrics of their iconic theme song. In , Donny and Marie also starred in their own feature film, Goin' Coconuts , which incorporated much singing and joking around—just like their variety show.
The project failed to impress critics or movie audiences. The two had dated in secret to protect her from media attention—attention that was beginning to wane.
TV audiences had grown tired of the squeaky clean brother-sister act and their renditions of older, family friendly songs. Disco and more urban styles of music were all the rage, making the Osmonds seem out of step with the times. After the show was cancelled, Osmond floundered professionally for many years. He was, as he has written on his website, "uncool to the max, a prisoner of my teenybopper past.
It wasn't until the late s that Osmond was able to revive his music career with help from an unlikely source—Peter Gabriel. At the time, Gabriel was enjoying great reviews as well as achieving chart success with his innovative rock. The musician allowed Osmond to use his studio in Bath, England, where he recorded his comeback single. Released in , Osmond's "Soldier of Love" reached the No. The followup single, "Sacred Emotion," also did well, climbing to No.
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