Laura Tuner - (laughing) Oh My!

John - Girl you can sing!

Laura - Oh, thank you. That's so sweet.

John - Atwhat point did you know that this was no ordinary voice?

Laura - I think that my mom picked it. I always sang as a little girl but my mom recognized it and many vocal teachers told her not to put me in training until I was sixteen.

John - What was the reason?

Laura - Because if you overload a young voice with the classical training you end up with a warble or an unpleasant vibrato and we've all heard those. (laughing) We were advised if we wanted to maintain the crystal clear sound and not overload it that would probably be the best idea. So, I'm very grateful to her for not pushing too hard until then.

John - Okay, when you started at sixteen did you go in head first or did you take it slow?

Laura - You know I took it very slow. I went to a performing arts high school and I had a really good voice teacher. She was very methodical we did real simple things first and she gradually got me ready for auditions into college. I got access to a lot of other types of music during that time. A lot of Pop and Country and I really got to explore the music and learning how to play the guitar and the piano. I was exposed to so many different genres of music so that's another reason I was so grateful not to be pushed into classical too quickly.

John - I like the way you sound almost a little country on some songs and pop on others and then Classical but too me this is foremost not about blending genre's to me, this is a vocal album. Secondly, though that blending that you do with your producers Kurt (Howell) and David (Huff) was a cool focus.

Laura - Absolutely, that was my goal. We started out wanting to have a nice marriage with the Classical music and Pop Music and I hope we did something great. (laughing)

John - How long has the album been out?

Laura - It's been out since the 5th of August and the single was not introduced to radio until the 20th of August.

John - What to you have to do to warm up your voice when you're in the studio? I'm not a singer but do you just walk up to the mic and sing at that level?

Laura - Well, I do lots of warm-up. When we were recording we would never record the classical things first we'd always start with the pop with a real warmed up voice and towards the end you have to be really warm for the Opera. So, we would always save it to the very end every time.

John - I've heard singers say an interesting thing about Opera that the first time they heard an opera piece they cried. Have you ever had that experience with Opera?

Laura - Absolutely. It is so full of sensuous moments, it's really breathtaking. I also had the same experience with Pop music. There are songs that Sarah Mclachlan does and I just think my gosh this is going to make me cry. So it's in both aspects that's why I really wanted to marry the two.

John - In a lot of ways your album could serve as a bridge for some music fans.

Laura - I hope so. I hope it is for younger music students.

John - How long from start to finish did it take you to record the album?

Laura - (laughing) That's a loaded question. This started out with me just doing it as an independent release. We had found the songs "Soul Deep." "Complete," "Devoted," "Where You Are" and "Baby Sleep" which I wrote and we were just going to put it out there on the internet thinking I'm doing what I love so here it is me and this is my art. Once we had recorded those songs Curb Records picked it up. It's been a process of over three years.

John - It's cool that here you were sticking to your guns determined to release it no matter if you got signed and all of a sudden all this happens. Things fell into place.

Laura - (laughing) Yes, they did I'm very grateful.

John - Have reviews compared you to Sarah Brightman and Enya a lot?

Laura - Yes, they have.

John - I'm sure you expected that though?

Laura - I did expect it and it makes me feel great because I love Sarah Brightman and I think her voice is amazing but I think that we're very different as far as our song choice and our expression and I'm way more pop.

John - You know on "Complete" you sound almost like Olivia Newton John?

Laura - (laughing)

John - Obviously, you are two very different singers and technically you are far superior but there's a place where your voice resonates with hers in there, in the middle. It's that warmth in both your voices. Do you know what I'm talking about?

Laura - Of course.

John - Was it hard for you to do certain songs? I mean your voice in pop music is kind of a runaway horse its range must of caused some problems singing certain songs?

Laura - Yes and no. There were difficult parts but I could always do both genres. The hard part in putting the album together was asking where do we put the classical voice and where do we put the pop without making it sound too cheesy by maybe singing a part too Classically or this part too Pop. So, that was the difficult part of it. As far as being able to singing different genre's that has never been a problem.

John - Interesting. I really though that someone with your range couldn't translate any song just because of your training and it would be too easy to over sing it.

Laura - I've come upon songs that don't do well.

John - You mean that don't translate well?

Laura - Yeah and I think every artist will get into the studio and everyone will say I think this is a great song but it's not for me.

John - Do you pay attention to the other multi octave singers out there like Mariah Carey or Celine Dion?

Laura - Well?

John - Or do you listen to music for music's sake and it doesn't have to have a great vocalist?

Laura - Oh, it definitely has to be a good vocalist for instance I think Christina Aguilera is amazing. I love her and then again I love Pink and they are two drastically different singers. I love all styles of music.

John - (laughing) And you recorded a Creed song!

Laura - (laughing) Yeah.

John - Were there different variations on how you did the song "My Sacrifice?"

Laura - No

John - You always knew that's how you wanted to do it?

Laura - No. I think it built on itself and once I decided to go ahead and try it we pulled out the little antique piano with the real cool groove underneath which is really sexy sounding and then once we started recording the vocals the producer said, "Man, it would be so cool to have a black choir to come in with hand claps." I thought yeah, that's great. (laughing) It just happened. Actually, I'm not sure how it happened. (laughing) I was listening to that song in the car and came up the stairs singing it and thought wow what a cool song this would be in a totally different style and it's so well written and the melody is so gorgeous.

John - Have you had any reaction from the boys in Creed?

Laura - No, we haven't.

John - Trust me you will

Laura - (laughing) Okay.

John - Are you in contact with your old classical teachers?

Laura - I'm really not.

John - Is there an Opera album in you?

Laura - (laughing) Oh, never say never!

John - Well said. Who knows where a career will go.

Laura - (laughing) Yeah thats true but not right now!