RACHEL FABRI speaks to Josanne Cassar about what it’s like to sing professionally in the UK with the classical crossover group All Angels
There was a point when Rachel Fabri was going to shelve her dream of ‘making it’ as a singer in the UK. In fact, she had already started shipping her personal belongings to Malta and was preparing to move back for a while. It was while she was visiting here this summer that she got the call that changed her life: she had been accepted to form part of the classical crossover group All Angels.
“It took me quite a while to get the audition,” Rachel says. “In fact, my plan was to take a gap year in Malta because things weren’t working out. I had already done five rounds of auditions to join the group when I finally got the call that I had made it.”
Rachel has been living in England for four years. At the age of 21, after graduating in psychology from the University of Malta, she managed to get into the Masters programme at the Guildford School of Acting to pursue her real dream: musical theatre.
After graduating, she got a taste of how tough it is to succeed in this genre… and trekking from audition to audition for the big West End shows like Les Miserables and Phantom, started to take its toll.
“For a girl in musical theatre it’s very hard because the competition is so fierce. I have a very good agent, but I would always get down to the finals for various shows, and it would always come down to me and someone else – and the other girl would always get the job. It was very frustrating. Slowly, my passion for dancing and acting started to wane but I never gave up on the singing, so I always took up whatever singing jobs I could find. It helped that I could also teach singing and drama to earn some money, and the fact that I had specialised in child psychology was to my advantage. In between I also appeared in a film which was being shot in Malta called The Devil’s Double, in which I played an Arabic singer… of all things!”
When she heard that a member of the All Angels group had left and they were looking for a replacement she decided to audition. This all-girl classical group had been singing together since they were 16 so it was important that whoever was chosen would gel with the group not only musically but also
personality-wise.
“I had their CD for ages, so I knew all about them, and I loved the idea of doing classical crossover. Basically we do classical twists of pop songs; it’s a four part vocal harmony for women, which is unusual to find.”
Once she joined All Angels, her life changed overnight. From the Royal Albert Hall to the O2 Arena, she is now singing at venues which every aspiring singer can only dream of. It is nice to know that it has not gone to her head, however: she is still the same sweet, low key young woman I remember from when she sang with VOICES. Almost shyly, she shows me the various concert programmes of where All Angels have performed – it’s quite an impressive CV.
“There is an organisation called Young Voices which is a charity for children with cancer. It’s the largest children’s choir in the world, and they invite guests on the show to perform with them, and we are one of the main guests. We’ve toured quite a lot, doing gigs in places like Crete and Spain. We’ve also done our own shows in Leicester Square and Somerset Theatre, and sometimes we are asked to perform at corporate functions. We also performed with Alexendra Burke who joined us on one of the tours and that was quite a nice moment…,” Rachel adds, and then she smiles at her own understatement.
Another highlight was singing with renowned soprano Lesley Garett, who may not be a familiar name for the average person, but who is immediately recognisable to all those who love musical theatre.
Asked what it’s like to sing in a group, she admits that it is very different to anything she’s done before. “Although I am used to working in a team because of musical theatre, this is a long term permanent thing, so you have to learn how to get along. Although I have been there for four years, at the end of the day I’m not English, so even culturally we’re very different. On the other hand, during radio and newspaper interviews, my nationality comes up all the time, so this makes me interesting, I guess. They are all very nice girls however and they have made me feel very welcome.”
Rachel realises that she is lucky to have stepped into a group that has already enjoyed a measure of success. They’ve released three albums so far under the Decca label (All Angels, Into Paradise and Fly Away) and have just released an EP of five songs on iTunes
“I’ve had to learn their whole repertoire, of course, but we are always looking for new material. Although we have an original song, we mostly do cover versions. When they were signed with Decca they didn’t have that much say, but now we are under new management, and this label gives us more control. In fact, the four of us help to choose the songs. What people don’t realise is that the music business has a very unglamorous side to it; you have to be careful, and need to have a good lawyer and accountant to protect your interests.”
I ask Rachel how much looks have to do with ‘making it’ in the music business:
“We always have to look our best obviously, but none of us is too obsessed with our figures thank God, so maybe we’re lucky to be in this genre. The pop music industry is usually more fixated with looks I think. When I was studying at Guildford you always had to look a certain way even because of the enormous competition… we couldn’t look sloppy or careless, it was quite strict and there was a lot of pressure to look good.”
During the month of December All Angels had so many engagements that they were pretty much living out of a suitcase, but Rachel does not mind one bit.
“Thank goodness, there seems to be a demand for our genre. Since I’ve joined the group, I feel that I have finally found my niche. I used to always dream of being on the West End, but sometimes life takes you in a different direction, and you realise that is what you are meant to be doing.”