The soulful sounds of Stevie Wonder echo softly from a boombox, empty
takeout cartons lay scattered across the only couch in the room, and a couple
of guys hang back in the corner talking quietly. Still, the cavernous rehearsal
studio is charged with anticipation. And a few minutes later we find out why,
when Mariah Carey walks in. Despite being the hottest pop sensation since
Whitney Houston, Carey, clad in a pair of worn jeans and simple white shirt, is
unassuming, almost bashful, as she reaches for the microphone. "Mind if I just
sort of play around a little?" she asks huskily. Soon the room is filled with a
heart-wrenching rhythm-and-blues ballad as this lissome diva carries the
listener away on a riveting seven-octave roller coaster of sound. From the
moment she can "remember remembering," Carey says, she's always wanted to
play around with sound. Which isn't surprising since the main influence of her
youth was her mother, a New York City Opera singer. "I knew from watching
and listening to my mom," explains the twenty-year-old, "that singing could
and would be my profession. And besides, she had to tear me away from the
radio each night just to get me to go to sleep." At seventeen, prompted by an
unquenchable desire to sing, Carey left her home on Long Island and moved in
with another struggling singer in New York City. It's here that the story takes
on a Cinderella-esque twist. In between waitressing-- for just enough money to
eat and pay rent-- Carey spent her time chlepping her demo tapes around town
to music execs who rarely, if ever, agreed to see her. Then one night... fate
stepped in. "I'd left my demo tape at this party," says Carey, "and Tommy
Mottola, the president of CBS Records, picked it up. There was no phone
number or anything on the tape, so the next day they tracked me down." Then
her single, VISION OF LOVE, broke music-industry records by topping ALL
the charts. Sounds as if the slipper fit, doesn't it?
Seventeen Mag, date and author unknown
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