Sarah Abo was eight years old when she first went to Carols By Candlelight with her family.
“Being a Melburnian, that’s what happens, right?” the Today co-host tells TV WEEK. “Oh my goodness, we loved it. My background is Syrian, so we always celebrate Christmas Eve, and so growing up, we used to go with our extended family and friends to Carols By Candlelight.
Sarah isn’t known for her singing, but perhaps she will be after Carols.
(Image: Supplied)“It’s just so beautiful and so festive and so wholesome.”
This year, Sarah’s family will be in the audience once again, while she’ll be up on stage, co-hosting with David Campbell.
“My gorgeous mum and dad will be [there], my husband will be there as well and I think my in-laws will be there too. But my sisters have just got two brand-new little babies – so probably a bit young for them to come along, past their bedtime – but they’ll be watching from home, which is very exciting.”
Today Extra co-host David has been fronting Vision Australia’s Carols By Candlelight since 2013 and describes it as “just so magical”. But he thinks Sarah will experience another level of excitement altogether, from having gone to Carols with her family when she was young.
“I find that a beautiful circle-of-life situation,” he tells TV WEEK.
“It’s just so beautiful and so festive and so wholesome.”
(Image: Supplied)As in previous years, David will be performing as well as hosting, joining a line-up that includes Paul Kelly – making his first-ever Carols appearance to sing “How To Make Gravy” – Clare Bowen and her husband Brandon Robert Young, and Emma Watkins. David says he’s happy to be performing a song that’s “a little bit fun”.
“I just didn’t feel like a ballad this year,” he says. “I wanted something just really ‘singalongy’, if that’s a word that I can make up.”
Sarah, 38, isn’t known for her singing, but perhaps she will be after Carols.
“I’m not going to take centre stage à la David Campbell, who has incredible vocal abilities – I’ll spare the audience that – but I’m definitely going to give it a crack,” she says.
David says Sarah has told him she’s “sporty, but not a dancer”.
“She tells me she played basketball as a kid, but didn’t do dancing, as she was too unco. I’m like, ‘I need to see that to believe that.’ So let’s see how she dances on stage on Christmas Eve.”
For Sarah, Carols marks the end of a whirlwind year, settling into her new role alongside Karl Stefanovic on Today. She says the team is “my second family now”, and Karl is an “incredible” broadcaster.
“He’s like a brother to me,” she says. “When you work with somebody so closely, it’s like your work husband. We just have so much fun.”
Sarah, who is married to account manager Cyrus Moran, was a night owl before landing the Today role. Going to bed early has been an adjustment, and she still sets three alarms every morning, “because I’m so paranoid about missing one of them”. But she now feels like a morning person.
“That’s what helped me feel a bit settled, when that alarm at 3am didn’t feel quite as punishing,” she recalls. “I’d get out of bed as if it was a regular thing.”
The past year has seen David turn 50 and also return to doing gigs.
(Image: Supplied)As for David – dad to Leo, 13, and twins Betty and Billy, eight, with casting director wife Lisa – the past year has seen him turn 50 and also return to doing gigs.
“It was a thrill to be back and finding my love and passion for singing again,” he says. “So a lot of good things for my soul happened this year… well, maybe not the age thing. I was freaking out going into 50, but now I’m here, I’m loving it.”
David, whose father is legendary rocker Jimmy Barnes, is seeing the family passion for music passed down to the next generation, with Billy getting his first drum kit this year (“electric, because we have neighbours”).
“He’s on it every day,” David reports. “Leo is great at piano and guitar, but he’s obsessed with it. I think you’ve got to be obsessed with your passions, and if you can make your passion your life, then even better.”
Whether David’s children will make a career out of music, he doesn’t know.
“I’ve told them one of the joys of my life is singing with my sister Mahalia, my dad or with [other siblings] EJ or Jackie or Elly,” he says.
“When we get together and sing, there’s a dynamic only families have. So I try to emphasise to my kids that you don’t need to form a band, but if you can play music with each other for the rest of your lives, you [too] can have this gift.”
Leo will be going to Carols By Candlelight with David, working backstage while his dad is hosting.
“I think he just wants to be involved,” David says. “I like that they put him to work. It’s a good lesson for him. You have to work your way up like everybody else.”
As for Sarah, she keeps thinking of “little childhood Sarah imagining that she’d be on the stage”.
“It’s incredible to think that on December 24 I’ll be on that stage with lots of other girls and boys watching. Of course, there are nerves, because it’s such a big event and it holds such a big place in my heart.”
