SWARTZ CREEK, Mich. (AP) - The first time Ramya Hall-Johnson put her vocals to the test, she was trying out for a Christmas play while in second grade. Years later, she would go on to sing in front of thousands of people at a time.
But for her first tryout, she needed solitude, The Flint Journal (https://bit.ly/1U3XyVk ) reported.
“I was scared at first. I remember when I tried out for it, I was too shy to sing in front of the classroom, and I asked the teacher to take me out in the hallway so I could sing to her,” Ramya said, while sitting on a couch near her mother and sister in the Swartz Creek home they moved into in recent years.
“She gave me a little part of it, because she thought I was too shy for the whole song. When I got up there (on stage at the play), I was scared, but I pushed it out of myself.”
With that first performance, Ramya launched a music career that has already taken her around Genesee County and across the country, including to the heralded Apollo Theater in New York City, all by 11 years old.
After seeing her daughter shine in the school play, Lakisah Hall began to look for vocal teachers to help develop her talents. She first connected her with a coach who taught classical and opera vocals, and eventually connected her with a coach who specializes in children who have breathing problems, since Ramya has asthma.
Since beginning to hone her voice, Ramya J - her stage name - has been making her rounds as a performer, with her family maintaining crew duties: her mother handles bookings and travel, while her sister takes care of her makeup to keep her looking stage-ready in ball gowns and jewelry.
Ramya has sung the national anthem at Shrine Circus shows around Michigan, travels out of town to audition for productions, including “America’s Got Talent,” and keeps busy with talent shows around Genesee County. Quickly, her mother said, music started to become a full-time job with two or three bookings per month and vocal lessons three times a week.
But her favorite performance, she says, was a trip to the Apollo Theater in New York City. The historic black venue was the home of the national TV show “Showtime at the Apollo,” and has been known as a breeding ground for young performers eager to show their chops.
She first auditioned in March, before advancing to the second round and performing on the actual Apollo stage in May. Judges asked her to perform “Let It Go,” a song from the soundtrack of the hit children’s film “Frozen.” The song wasn’t her first choice - songs like Etta James’ “At Last” more closely fit her powerful vocal style, her mother says - but she had practiced that song with her instructor before, and she knocked out during the performance.
“There were a lot of people. And when I hit the last note, I was able to step further onto the stage because it was bigger,” Ramya remembers.
The winner was determined by audience applause, and she lost by a small margin: Her opponent’s applause gauge was 87, and hers was 84. Her mother believes that she could have won if she had hometown support the way that her opponent did, and is waiting to see if they will get another call to perform since the scores were so close.
Ramya is still tackling her career full-steam, though. She won a Swartz Creek talent show shortly after she arrived back home, and by the end of the summer she plans to complete her first original song, a collaboration with her vocal teacher. She eventually hopes to get a record deal and enjoy the spotlight of her favorite singers: Whitney Houston, Beyoncé, Ariana Grande and Mariah Carey.
She will be starting home schooling next year, since she was missing so much class due to her busy performing schedule.
“We’re all for education, we’ve put her through public and private schools,” Hall said, while giving kudos to the school principal and school board for being willing to work with them during the year. “We just didn’t know it was going to take off this quick.”
Hall said that seeing her daughter’s passion for singing makes her comfortable with letting her focus on it full time. She said that her daughter tells her that she would prefer to perform or practice instead of doing other children’s activities, and that has made her more friends and gotten her on the honor roll since she began singing.
“What made me jump out on a limb is that I saw a totally different kid on stage. We always laugh and say she has an old soul; she sings from something deep down. She’s not the average 11-year-old,” she said.
“That’s a God-given talent. He made her a little different than everybody else. But if she says she doesn’t want to do it, and she just wants to go back to being a kid, then it’s done.”
Otherwise, Ramya will be stepping to the microphone and following her dreams.
___
Information from: The Flint Journal, https://www.mlive.com/flint
Please read our comment policy before commenting.