Daughter of a DJ, Sister of an avid soul fan, grew up surrounded by music, has travelled the world with her craft since 16 years of age and now a multi-award-winning artist including “best new soul act” “best current UK soul artist” multiple times. Performed in some of the most well-known venues such as London palladium. Worked for the BBC on large corporate events as well as her own touring. Singer, Radio host, song writer, performers.
From a young age Natasha wanted to be in the entertainment industry with a specific interest in musicals. She trained in a local dance school. There was an understanding that she had a talent in entertainment from a young age she developed skills across all aspects of entertainment.
Remembering her early aspirations Nastasha recalls wanting to perform on the west-end or on cruise ships. She confesses she wasn’t aiming for the stars but wanted to do what she enjoyed and had a talent for – Dancing. When she reached her teens, she attended some audiences but recalls not even being given the opportunity to dance in the cut-throat rejection process where she was told she was too short for consideration at 5ft 2. Natasha admits it was quite a blow at that age and singing came about almost as a default.
After which Natasha leapt into singing and secured a job at a holiday park in 1994. Natasha worked six days a week 9AM - Midnight, earnt £85 and received accommodation included, but no food.
Natasha was able to secure a couple more contracts, one of which was a dancing contract in Italy which turned out to be for the Mafia, so she swiftly returned to the UK before flying to America where she really discovered she could sing. She later returned to the UK on vacation where she met her son’s father at 18, while she returned to America, young love bought her back to the UK to reunite and later fell pregnant with her son. Unfortunately, the relationship didn’t last and Natasha parented her son as a single parent. Natasha’s son is now 27 and has just welcomed his own child into the world and a “great kid”. She adds that she doesn’t regret halting her career at that stage and while she met some challenges raising a child on her own an taught her some very valuable lessons.
Rolling forward to 2007 Natasha still had a dream of singing. She met some people while she was working at a university who were in a band, so she encouraged them to let her sing. At this stage she was a lecturer at the college and an estate agent but at the heart of it all she was still selling herself. So, without necessarily understanding it at the time, through the roles she had taken she had learnt a craft that few people have: the ability to ask for business, to sell yourself and the tenacity to not take no for an answer.
In 2008 Natasha sadly lost her mum who was the driving force behind Natasha and her dreams. Her last wish for Natasha was to pursue her singing. At this time Natasha was 30, she had tried auditioning for talent programmes such as the voice and the x-factor to no prevail, so she ultimately believed she wasn’t good enough or it wasn’t meant to be. Within the music business, success is effectively decided by a third-party, be that the record label, producer or radio station, someone else has the power to create the artists dreams.
In 2010 Natasha’s mum had been gone two years, and she spoke to her husband, Neil, and said she wanted to give a music another try. Previously Natasha wouldn’t have considered song writing, but her life experience had given her a new lease to try singing and songwriting collaboratively. She already loved soul and house music and thinks of herself as a bit of a diva! She reached out to people on music-based social networking site MySpace, and they invited her to a studio session. Later she started using Facebook when that launched. At this stage social media was still very embryotic, and the rise of these platforms helped her gain some traction.
Natasha started off with house music, she would sing for nothing, and some of her biggest songs where when she first started out and she never got remunerated for them. She confesses that she was naïve but the more she got “ripped off” the more she learnt.
Now in 2023 Natasha is on Album Number 4, completely self-funded and self-promoted. She spent about £30K on the album but has recouped it several times over through gigs, merchandise and touring and now runs a 6figure very successful company.
At the heart of it all Natasha had a passion, the passing of her late mother put life into perspective. Natasha admits that she went through a period of turmoil after her passing when she was only 30 but fees that would never have pursued her passion had her mother not passed. She recalls being quite comfortable as an estate agent, earning a comfortable wage, but was often called upon as social gatherings and events to sing by friends and family, which she describes as an interim fix, but once she got a real experience of performing, she had to pursue it.
Turning point, 2015, walking out onto the royal albert hall opening up for Miss Gladys Knight on her UK tour, Natasha did seven shows with her. She recalls standing on stage thinking, how did I get here? Having only started in 2010 with no management, business partners or record label to then performing on stage with 5000 people in the audience.
Natasha recounts that in the absence of a professional support network, such as a manager or record label, she made a lot of mistakes along the way. She adds that a lot of the most successful business people have failed multiple times along their journey, taking risks is part and parcel of meeting success.
One of these such risks, was ensuring that the bills could be paid while Natasha started out, long before she had any revenue as an artist. Her husband afford her the financial support in the home to be able to pursue her passion.
Contrary to external opinion Natasha says that she has never had what she would deem as a massive hit, but has consistently had tracks that have been received very well. That changed somewhat in 2023 with one of her tracks going global but in terms of quantifying it, she adds that she would never be in the national charts as she’s not a pop act. Nowadays its not just one chart either, where previously it was just the Top 40 which was recorded on record sales, not streams or air play! So, to get on National Radio, you still have to pay somewhat to get there.
Reaching the National Charts isn’t something that Natasha is investing in, that’s more a of a record labels responsibility, unless in unique circumstances where a track might go viral but Natasha also recognises that to do this, artists are still giving their music away, while she still needs to make money from her music so streaming doesn’t work for her.
