“You always have a song that hits that personal chord and so I’ll definitely be fighting that,” said singer/actress Rashidra Scott.
“Just imagining hearing the entire symphony and orchestra behind me playing this song … I just closed my eyes and let myself feel it and was just telling the story – almost to myself.”
As she rehearses to step into the musical shoes of Whitney Houston and perform selections from the iconic singer’s musical catalog with the accompaniment of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, emotions have gotten the best of her each time she performs the classic “One Moment in Time.”
“I was just talking to my mom about how the song really hit me,” Scott said. “As performers and people in general, you do all this work and you make all of these plans as far as creating a path, and then preparation finally meets opportunity and it’s your one moment. And that’s what this is for me.”
Like so many other female singers, Scott owes her career to Whitney Houston after hearing “The Greatest Love of All” blast through the radio as a toddler.
“The song would come on the radio and I just have memories of me hanging off the banister swinging around and just screaming it from the top of my lungs,” Scott said.
“That’s how my mom found out I could even sing. I feel like she was the reason I was able to find my voice and start singing and start performing. There was something about hearing her voice and her gift that connected with me at three years old that awoke this gift in me.”
Her talent would take her from belting in the halls of her childhood home in Virginia all the way to Broadway, most recently as a featured performer in the musical Sister Act.
In what will certainly be among her most challenging career moments, Scott will now embody Houston through nearly 20 songs and two hours of music. There will be a hint of sorrow because of the singer’s untimely passing last year at the age of 48, but Scott says the performance will be more of a musical celebration than a memorial.
“I’m looking forward to reintroducing the time when America fell in love with her,” Scott said.
“It’s also so nice to revisit the time where there were great lyrics and songwriters. You go into the rehearsals, and you listen to the difference in the musicality of those songs. And you could tell a story, and it wasn’t just about repeating two lines for three and a half minutes – they came from the soul.”
Being selected from a pool of talented singers who auditioned for the opportunity, Scott calls her upcoming performance in the SLSO tribute to Houston “an unrealized dream come true.”
“I know what the task is and I know what the gig is, so I’m just preparing myself for that,” Scott said. “I haven’t really got into the nerves of that part of it yet. For me, the nerves will probably come about halfway through the show. Once the preparation meets the opportunity, about halfway through the opportunity I’m like, ‘Oh crap, this is happening.’”
And to be backed by the Saint Louis Symphony is the icing on the cake.
“On Broadway there’s always that wonderful moment where you have those strings and the full orchestra, and I’ve kind of had that experience on the small scale, but I don’t even think my brain has grasped this,” Scott said.
“Actually, I’m starting to grasp it – which is why I’ve had such an emotional experience during the rehearsals of ‘One Moment in Time.’ I’m just excited, and I’m just ready.”
Rashidra Scott will front the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra in “The Music of Whitney Houston” 8 p.m. Friday, May 17 at Powell Symphony Hall. For tickets or more information, visit http://www.stlsymphony.org/ or call (314) 534-1700.
