At age 16, when my voice changed a bit, I sang alto for another year or so. Those lady sopranos had great voices, I was in awe, and they were so generous to me, lot of cheek pinching, accolades and nurturing, and the beginning of my joy of singing. At age 15, I started playing organ at St. Christopher’s Church for Sunday service, funeral, weddings and received $7.00 a performance. At 17, I sang for a glee club member’s wedding and was introduced and accompanied on the church organ by Joanne Boltelo. Joanne had a music studio in town and she encouraged me to pursue my dream of singer/songwriting. I had my first real “voice lesson” with her (other than warm ups) and later she helped me get ready for my audition at SMU- now called UMass Dartmouth - where I did get in and studied voice. During those years I had various roles in musicals; my favorite role being “Burger” in “Hair”, “Snoopy” in “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown”, played Charlie in another production, and other musicals and plays in and around campus, community theatre, always consistent by still completely frustrating choreographers.  Once I started singing, my feet just did what they wanted. Between keyboard lessons, Glee Club, shows, weddings, Christmas parties, voice lessons, bad dancing, my eclectic music foundation built me an escape and distraction from those confusing years.  It was just the tonic for a weary young soul, gave me confidence, gave me purpose, a way then and now to create music. Before we leave this part of my “Sentimental Journey”, I am so grateful for all the love and support of friends, my Mom for guiding me towards music lessons, my Dad for taking me to “Fiddler on the Roof” and his always loving support of me, my sister Gisele, glee club members for being so sweet to me, some very supportive professors, fellow musicians, and Muriel and Joe. From my basement, spinning and singing along to records, to playing and singing with any keyboard I could find, on stage performances etc. - it all makes sense now!  One sidebar about church- I so appreciate them giving me a church organist’s career. It did end two years into it when I played “Gesenme” from Jesus Christ Superstar. My performance was great, but not something churchgoers in Tiverton were accustomed to or needed to hear; irrelevant and dramatic. I think I really shocked them. What can I say, I was a rebellious teen too! Music became my little world.  The next step in my little world was to move to a city and start writing and create an original rock band. NYC was too intimidating and LA too far. Boston was more accessible, a place that was always in and out of my life. Whatever my next move was, it required a big chunk of money - that’s where next phase came in, Provincetown.  I heard I could make lots of money there in the summer. But the “Spiral Land” became so much more than making money. Provincetown “P-town” became a huge step in my connections for Boston and music development. Tourists come from all over the country and all over the world into P-town. I stepped out of Tiverton, Fall River and Dartmouth, and started performing in the “real” world. You could say it felt like, still does feel like the place, where my “young adult artist” with long hair, torn jeans, big dreams and big earrings was born. Now older with little hair, a torn jacket, a small earring, I have a deep satisfaction, enriched by the paths followed for those dreams.  Dreams shift, but the music created, and that joy of creating, lives forever in my soul.

I got a job at The Towne House right in the center of P-town. It had a piano bar right in front on the main drag of Commercial Street and also a piano bar in the back that opened on weekend nights – I would eventually perform in both bars. A started waiting tables and used to walk by the pianist Chuck Nichols with my trays and sing along. He told me to bring some of my sheet music, wanted to hear what I could do. We hit it off! I then became the Towne House’s “singing cocktail waiter”. Chuck was well known in town, he was in his 30’s (I thought that was old then!) established as one of the best on the old 88’s, learned from his mother Mary, who was also well known. He knew a lot of the old songs from my Glee Club days. Every hour or so I would get up and I would do a few songs like Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Imagine, Summertime and Sentimental Journey and then go back to my cocktailing. It was a great experience, got some amazing tips, accolades, important Boston connections. I have to tell you my uniform had torn “short shorts” (32” waist) jeans, a tuxedo jacket with no sleeves, a bowtie, no shirt, and I had a huge copper earring and bracelet (got both from a Native American artist, engraved Elements of the earth). I still wear bracelet to this day for every performance and huge copper matching earrings. My hair was long and in a Mary Tyler Moore flip, and on my feet were wooden clogs. On the weekends I also worked with the infamous Bobby Weatherbee - now Bobby didn’t let just anyone sing with him, he was/is a top shelf performer, but he made an exception for me. Many a Saturday night I’d work both rooms, racing through the kitchen to the next room, my clogs clicking on the hard wood floors. I’m grateful to them, both firm yet so generous and nurturing. I was also working on the side with pianist Joseph Arnt, parties and such. Made some “coin”, found a space to move to in Boston, but before Boston I backpacked through Europe, traveling with a guitarist called Seth. I learned a lot of Beatles songs, traveled for 6 weeks, came back inspired and off to “Beantown” to be a rock star!

Part of my dream was to go to Berkeley School of Music.  I did get in, but the tuition was so expensive, and it was easy to transfer to U-Mass Boston, so I went with what I could afford.  My mentor from P-Town, Sarah, knew that I couldn’t afford Berkeley but connected me to the best from the school. Sarah worked with the Aerosmith team for their comeback.  Marc Baxter was a vocal coach infamous in the 80’s and still is today. He was especially known back then for bringing Steven Tyler’s voice back. Today he’s also worked with Rob Thomas, Sam Smith etc. I got my audition through Sarah, and after filling out a hundred questionnaires and submitting a tape I got the connection and audition.  He was of course very honest: “You don’t have great voice, but you have a good voice, great range, and the right personality.  If you get with the right people who can develop you, the right arrangements, help you through writing, you could showcase that vocal range and do great things.” He accepted me and I studied with him and also studied Vox at U-Mass Boston. U-Mass was also a great experience, was in a few bands, an opera, choirs, but the best part is where I met TC (who studied piano there) who has been one of my biggest influences of my songwriting and music development. I was doing a Christmas Show, someone asked if I knew “Winter Wonderland” I said yes, but I knew very little, I faked it, TC was in the front row in hysterics. Complimentary of my performance after and especially loving my fake Winter Wonderland, we became fast friends. TC is an amazing pianist and vocalist, you’ll hear him many times in my body of work, on keys and vocals. TC was very weary of the stage (until later), so I eventually branched out to different incarnations of my bands, but TC was always somewhere in my scene. Especially those early years, endless nights singing around the piano, doing Beatles, Grateful Dead, and writing originals. I came from the world of theatre, old music (from Glee Club) piano bars, and pop music; TC taught me Dillon, Billie, The Band, etc.  It all was a new world for me!