Ok - a little bit about me!
I was born in Basildon, Essex - thats right, an Essex girl! I have 2 older brothers (Matthew & Chay) and 2 wonderful parents (Helen & Roy).
We all play the piano, my brothers both went up to Grade 7, my dad went up to Grade 5, and my mum and I got our Diplomas - entitling us to letter after our names. my full title is Natalie Thurlow ALCM (Associate of the London College of Music). Matthew spends all his spare time composing music, and Chay took up the drums and is a fantastic player. (Check out The Nat Pack someday!!) My mum is now a retired Music teacher, but both my mum and dad still play the piano for fun!!
I now have a grand total of 5 nieces!!! Abigail, Grace, Emily, Isabelle and the youngest one, Ruby. All gorgeous, and each have their own unique personalities!
Obviously the Piano is my main instrument, but I also took the Trombone up to Grade 5 and the Saxophone up to Grade 3.
I started singing when I was 14 and I was in my first band which was 'Doctor Palmer and his seven daughters'!
As you can imagine, it wasn't really my cup of tea, but still a lot of fun!
I have been very lucky to work with so many Amateur Dramatic Societies, and for the past few years I have turned my hand to Musical Directing - which I love. The shows I have run to date are - Half A Sixpence, Annie Get Your Gun, Annie, Lust, Barnum, High Society, Mack and Mabel, and a second production of Annie. I am currently working on Fiddler on the Roof and The King and I. This production is for the charity, Lennox - which is a wonderful group who help Children with Cancer.
Since 2002, I have been playing for 'The Howard Wallace Chorale' in Shenfield, Essex, under the direction of Tim Rhys-Morgan.
A fantastic choir consisting of about 80 singers. Please read about them from my Links page.
At 18, I was approached by my music teacher who asked if I would come and sing with his Function band at weekends - a great opportunity which I snapped up! The band's name was 'Sounds Around' which after about 6 months joined with another band, and we became 'Sunset Boulevard'. A typical Function band, playing all the standards for Weddings, parties etc.
As the band began to fold, my music teacher, now very good friend, John Stevenson asked if I wanted to be in a duo with him, so 'It takes Two' was formed in 2000. We worked up until the end of 2002 as I had now met the lovely Nikky Napier who asked me if I would like to join 'Calico'.
I quickly explained that I knew absolutely nothing about the Country/Linedance circuit but Nikky assured me that I would soon grow to love it, which indeed I did!
Nikky and I became the best of friends, and I loved working with both her and Shanks (Brian)
The band, as all bands do, went through their changes, but all for the better.
At the end of 2006, I left Calico, which, to date, has been the hardest decision to make. I have always worked heavily with the Amateur Dramatic circuit, and with the amount of workload that Calico had, I found it impossible to do both.
After 3 months of leaving - I was asked to do Peace-Trains social, which just made me realise how much I missed everybody!
So, with the encouragement from Peace-Train, I started up on my own, and also started a band called 'The Nat Pack' - it has worked much better for me, as I now run my own diary and can cater for everything - including sleep!!
I have now been awarded a Crystal Boot Award for being the 'Dedicated Dance Artist' for 2009... An absolute honour.
Thank you for reading.
N x
