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May 6, 2008 9:22 am US/Central
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Dream Jobs: Angela Davis Sings Like Stevie Wonder
(WCCO)
This month we are looking at dream jobs that each of us on the morning show wish we could do. Last week my co-anchor Bill Hudson got to be an architect. He spent time with a real one, observing the techniques and tools he uses.
If I could do anything for a living, it would be singing professionally. So I asked a well-known Twin Cities singer to help me out.
You've probably heard of Jevetta Steele or The Steeles, a singing group made up of her siblings. They put on an elaborate Christmas show each year at the Fitzgerald Theatre in St. Paul or at the State Theatre in Minneapolis.
Steele has released her own jazz album and performed on numerous others. She also sang at my wedding 12 years ago.
I asked her if she thought her ability to sing so powerfully is genetic. She said it was. Her father was a singer, his father was a singer, her children all sing, and all her siblings sing.
She said her high school choir teacher helped her the most. Steele was singing opera by the time she was 15. She's never taken professional voice lessons.
"It is as much a part of me as spirituality and breathing," she said.
I recently went to Steele's house in Golden Valley, Minn. for a singing lesson. I told her how glamorous I think singing is, to be able to use your voice to entertain an audience.
Even though she always looks calm, cool and collected on stage, she told me that she still gets nervous.
"It's nerve-racking," said Steele, who calls her voice an instrument. "It's like taking your clothes off to the world and asking, 'What do you think?'"
The first thing she helped me with was figuring out where my strength lies, and if there is any chance that I might be able to improve.
After singing scales, she determined my high notes are painful to the ear.
"You're definitely an alto because you are comfortable in your lower range. When it gets high you get a little nervous and it's like, 'Ugh,'" she said.
We then set out to pick a song that's suitable for me to attempt to sing. We settled on one by my favorite artist Stevie Wonder: "My Cherie Amour." You may know it by the words: "My cherie amour, pretty little one that I adore, you're the only one my heart beats for. How I wish that you were mine. La-la-la-la-la-la. La-la-la-la-la-la."
Steele is off to Greece next month to perform in a musical called The Gospel at Colonnus.
"I think my job is to take better care of my instrument every day and as I get older to make sure I am singing the kind of things that have meaning and leave a legacy."
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