CULTURE

Emma Shapplin in Rendi

“I find it easier to communicate, to say something different, something clearer and more precise, through singing rather than speaking,» says singer Emma Shapplin, who will give three unique performances, tomorrow to Sunday, at the Big Top Theater, which is situated at the Allou Fun Park in Rendi. Shapplin, whose work combines the emotional intensity of opera and the directness of pop music, will interpret songs from her album «Carmine Meo» (which includes the hit song «Spente le Stelle») as well as her latest release, «Etterna.» Shapplin’s story has fairy-tale quality. Born in Paris in 1974, she gave no indication of her future career when a child. She was too shy to even talk, let alone try singing. Things changed at age 11 when she heard the «Queen of the Night» from Mozart’s opera «The Magic Flute.» Opera made a great impression on her and that was when she decided she wanted to sing. «That music touched my soul,» she confessed years later. At the age of 14, she got to know an old music teacher and started her first singing lessons. Those were very happy times for young Emma, who felt she had found her true calling in life. Her parents, however, were in favor of their daughter aiming for a more secure profession and put some pressure on her to quit the singing lessons and focus on school. But her need to sing remained strong and Emma expressed it by performing in a heavy-metal band that some schoolfriends had formed. Two years later, finding she still missed opera, she returned to her opera singing lessons. Her first album, «Carmine Meo,» released in 1997, was highly successful. Four years later, her second album, «Etterna,» which mostly consists of songs that she has written herself, was released. Big Top Theater, Allou Fun Park, Kifissou & Petrou Ralli, Rendi, tel 210.921.3310.

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