The sound of Success

Sometimes you have the privilege of hearing a story that makes you feel like a schmuck for ever feeling sorry for yourself.  Here's one of them.  Mandy Harvey was heading into her Freshman year as a vocal major at CSU in Fort Collins, Colorado.  Obviously being a vocal major you can probably place a safe bet that singing was her main passion and love.  That year at CSU she gradually started loosing her hearing to the point where a couple years later she is now legally deaf.  You can imagine what a dent that could put in your dreams of becoming a singer when you can't hear the notes you're singing.  Mandy gave up for a while, as most of us would.  It's so easy to fall into the victim mentality when you're going through something that is so tough like that.  Unlike some of us though, Mandy got back up and started doing what she loved again, whether it was going to be hard or not.  Now, because of her tenacity the rest of the world has the honor to be open ears for this beautiful story and her beautiful music.

Mandy does a lot of Jazz covers and has a CD called "Smile" in which she does many of these covers.  It's such a treat to hear classic jazz songs sung by such a young soul with such emotion.  That's the amazing thing with Jazz that can get lost in some other genres is the raw emotion in each song.  A good Jazz singer lets that emotion take them over and pours it out onto the audience.  Mandy's rendition of Smile definitely does that.  She takes an amazing Charlie Chaplin song and puts a velvet layer on top that is rarely heard or felt. 



Mandy is getting to release her newest album "After You've Gone" on November 27th.  I am very excited to hear some new songs as well as some originals that will hopefully be all over this album.  I honestly don't have a ton to write about Mandy that hasn't already been said.  She's so many things all in one: an inspiration, motivation to continue to challenge myself, proof that love for something can't be taken away, proof that you use your struggles to touch people even more than you did before, and more than anything she's a beautiful singer!



Please visit her website and buy her album on cdbaby.com!
http://www.mandyharveymusic.com/

- Kev