Of Thee I Sing

The other day we found ourselves in the midst of a discussion about favorite singers and musical influences, and here’s the twist! They weren’t our personal inspirations but those of other artists. We were pretty surprised at who admired whom. It seems a shame to keep all the fun to ourselves, so for your cyber amusement here’s a little quiz to start off your week. Can you match the admirer to the admired? For brevity’s sake we’ve kept it to just one per performer. We’ll post the answers in a day or two.

Performer                           Influence

1.) Madonna                       A.) Frank Sinatra

2.) Beyoncé                        B.) Maria Callas

3.) Jim Morrison                C.) Connee Boswell

4.) Stevie Wonder             D.) Judy Holliday

5.) Linda Ronstadt             E.) Mario Lanza

6.) Ella Fitzgerald              F.) The Staples Singers

7.) Christina Aguilera       G.) Bessie Smith

8.) Billie Holiday               H.) Harry Nilsson

9.) Mary Lou Williams      I.) Stevie Wonder

10.) John Lennon             J.) Etta James

11.) Elvis                          K.) Lovie Austin

Now, on a not-quite-unrelated note, if you swivel your eyes to the right of this column and take a peek at Where in the World Are the Redheads?, you’ll note that Miss Laurel has a few gigs coming up. This weekend she’s got a solo concert with Tex Arnold at the Tusten Theatre in upstate NY. Come June, she’ll be reuniting with Lauren Kinhan and Janis Siegel aka JaLaLa, for gigs at Albany’s Egg and NYC’s Birdland (in case you’re wondering, their musical influences are the Boswell Sisters, and the Ronettes). We’ve decided to give away a free ticket to the Birdland date. All you have to do to enter the fray is post a comment here about who your influences have been, musical or otherwise. Tell us who you admire and why, and the entry that inspires us the most will get the tic. We’re looking forward to hearing from you!