When it came to discovering her voice, Angel Rattay was a late bloomer.
The striking 35-year-old Overland Park resident started singing four years ago by accident. She was lending a hand at her mother’s Truman Lake-area bar and restaurant one Saturday evening when the regular singer needed to rest between sets and nurse a sore throat. Rattay’s mother, nervous she’d lose the attention of the paying crowd on a busy weekend night, asked her daughter to jump on stage and sing.
“You don’t tell my mom ‘no’ under any circumstance,” says Rattay. “I was shocked because she knew I didn’t sing.”
With some cajoling from her mother and a quick gathering of her wits, a trembling Rattay climbed the stage and leafing through the sick entertainer’s music found one familiar song. It was Martina McBride’s “My Baby Loves Me” that sparked Rattay’s vocal chords on a journey that has taken the singer to Nashville to record a CD, open concerts for some big-name country bands and ultimately find her musical and life soul mate.
Rattay says she’s forged her musical identity honestly and on her own terms.
“I grew up in a family that sang gospel and country,” says Rattay. “Everyone kidded me that I inherited my dad’s singing abilities, which amounted pretty much to nothing. I was a great singer—alone in the car.”
Rattay did sing at a family reunion as a tyke when she got up and belted out a pint-sized version of “Hit the Road Jack” while her cousins politely sang church songs.
But something happened that night—and during subsequent weekend gigs—on the tiny stage in her mom’s establishment decades after her family reunion performance. Rattay discovered she liked to sing. That life-transforming solo turn in front of an audience boosted Rattay’s musical self-confidence and stage presence. She soon abandoned childhood tastes for rock artists, developing instead an affinity for country music by household names such as Shania Twain, the Dixie Chicks and Garth Brooks.
“I grew up listening to my mom’s favorites, like the Motown sound,” says Rattay. “As a teenager it was the usual 1980s rock suspects—Def Leppard, Bon Jovi and Rush. One day during a long drive back to Kansas City from Minnesota, the only radio station I could get was country. I was hooked.”
Rattay met a writer who connected the burgeoning country singer to a Nashville producer. She traveled to Music City U.S.A. to record a few songs and decided, with the producer’s encouragement, to collect enough songs for an entire CD. It was a very personal process, with Rattay insisting each song had heart-and-soul meaning for her, convinced that her passion for the music would be transferred to listeners.
“Hundreds of songwriters from across the country—some of them doing No. 1 hits for big names—pitched material,” says Rattay. “Some days I listened to 25 songs.”
Rattay, who doesn’t read music but rather “feels” notes, knew in the first 10 seconds of listening to a song whether it struck an essential internal chord. Her 2006 debut CD project titled “Flying Blind” emerged with 14 carefully chosen songs and a sense of satisfaction for the singer. But Rattay quickly moved from that initial album’s success to the “what’s next” phase of her music career.
“I needed a local band to start practicing, performing and growing with,” says Rattay. “I found a drummer online and he arranged auditions at Kerry Alexander’s house.”
Alexander, a Kansas City, Kan., native who owns a construction business, is a well-known guitarist in the city, playing with his band Monkey Finger and others. He spent time in Los Angeles during the 1990s chasing a music dream and returned to Kansas when his father was diagnosed with cancer.
“I didn’t like the L.A. scene,” says Alexander. “I came back home to be with my dad, but I was glad to get away from that fast pace and the big egos.”
Alexander auditioned that night for Rattay’s band; he now plays lead guitar and vocals and writes many songs the group performs. The singer and her guitarist started dating in late 2007, and it’s a match made in musical heaven.
“There was a definite connection,” says Alexander. “And I’ve never met anyone with perfect pitch until Angel.”
The couple spent time alone in the studio following weekly practice, discussing material and writing some preliminary songs. Alexander saw an earnest talent unfolding before his eyes, and Rattay saw a talented musician who had been around the block and whose playing appeared magical and effortless.
“Kerry is a phenomenal guitarist and insanely talented,” says Rattay. “His rock background gives our music a modern feel and an interesting edge. And we have a wonderful group of musicians assembled.”
Rattay’s band includes drummer Ray Santo, guitarist/vocalist Carl Worden, utility player Dan Torchia and bassist Tony Combs. Most recently the group opened for country superstars Restless Heart at the VooDoo Lounge to a receptive audience. In addition Rattay, whose stage presence is passionate and captivating and whose song preference includes those that are sassy and full of attitude, has played at Starlight prior to a Gary Allan concert, opened for popular country band Sawyer Brown and won the Kansas City 2007 Country Wars battle of the bands competition.
Currently Rattay is traveling back and forth to Nashville recording her second CD, slated for a spring release, which will feature two favorite songs, “Perfect Strangers” written by Alexander and Victoria Shaw’s “Sounds of Goodbye.” Shaw, a Nashville-based writer, has penned hits including Garth Brooks’ “The River.” Rattay is drawn to both songs for different reasons.
“Kerry’s song has a soft, sweet melody,” says Rattay. “And I heard Victoria’s during the search for songs on “Flying Blind.” It’s a vocal stretcher, and I have the confidence to sing that now.”
Rattay isn’t sure of the new CD’s title track.
“These things take on a life of their own,” says Rattay. “It’s like naming your baby before it’s born and then realizing he looks nothing like a Henry, but more like a Jack.”
For more information on Angel Rattay’s CDs and appearances, visit www.angelrattay.com.
words: Kimberly Winter Stern
photos: Laurel D. Austin