Nicola Emmanuelle
Encyclopedia
Early life, education
Nicola Emmanuelle comes from a South African jazz dynasty. Her Father Nathan ‘Dambuza’ Mdledle was the founder and lead singer of the Manhattan BrothersManhattan Brothers
The Manhattan Brothers was a popular South African music group in the 1940s and 1950s, during the Apartheid Era. Their sound drew on American ragtime, jive, swing, doo-wop, and several other jazz strains, as well as African choral and Zulu harmonies...
and a South African Hall of Famer, her mother Louisa Manuel also in the South African Hall of Fame, the female lead singer with the Woodpeckers. Nicola attended the Cleo Laine School of Music followed by the Bourne school of Music and Goldsmiths Foundation
Edward Goldsmith
Edward René David Goldsmith , widely known as Teddy Goldsmith, was an Anglo-French environmentalist, writer and philosopher....
, then underwent classical training by Elizabeth Anderson Kramer.
Music career
Emmanuelle was invited by the multi-Academy Award nominee and Bafta winner, composer George FentonGeorge Fenton
George Fenton is a British composer best known for his work writing film scores and music for television, although he also writes music for the theatre. His real name is George Howe but he is better known by his pseudonym of George Fenton.-Selected film and television credits:Fenton has composed...
and award winner Sir Richard Attenborough
Richard Attenborough
Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough , CBE is a British actor, director, producer and entrepreneur. As director and producer he won two Academy Awards for the 1982 film Gandhi...
to sing the opening score "Crossroads – a Dawn Raid" to the successful British film Cry Freedom
Cry Freedom
Cry Freedom is a 1987 British drama film directed by Richard Attenborough, set in the late 1970s, during the apartheid era of South Africa. It was written from a screenplay by John Briley based on a pair of books by journalist Donald Woods...
.
This led to numerous musical and film collaborations in the late eighties notably with the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, singing on Death is Part of the Process, then with Pete Townshend
Pete Townshend
Peter Dennis Blandford "Pete" Townshend is an English rock guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and author, known principally as the guitarist and songwriter for the rock group The Who, as well as for his own solo career...
on his The Iron Man Musical album and with Phil Fearon
Phil Fearon
Phil Fearon is a British record producer. He was the lead singer, songwriter and keyboardist for the 1980s band Galaxy.-Career:...
of Galaxy where she branched into pop music with the club classic Touch.
Between 1990 and 1997 Emmanuelle stopped performing live, instead working behind the scenes; and it wasn’t until 1998 when George Fenton called her back to the live scene for a BBC live radio Christmas concert "Christmas at the Movies" with Lord Attenborough and Alan Bennet.
This sudden return led to her working with Gabrielle Yared on the movie soundtrack of City of Angels, and again with George Fenton for the "Mandela Benefit Concert'’ at the Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
followed the next year with her and Gabrielle Yared both debuting at "The Proms."
Emmanuelle also worked in 1999 with Mike Oldfield
Mike Oldfield
Michael Gordon Oldfield is an English multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, working a style that blends progressive rock, folk, ethnic or world music, classical music, electronic music, New Age, and more recently, dance. His music is often elaborate and complex in nature...
on his Milllenium album Milllenium Belle
The Millennium Bell
The Millennium Bell is the 20th record album by Mike Oldfield, released in 1999 . The theme of the album is a reflection of different periods of human history. The album borrows its name from the dawning of the 3rd millennium and Oldfield's Tubular Bells series of albums...
, performing with him in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
for Germany’s Millenium celebrations.
Whilst concentrating on Movie Soundtracks over the next six years; including Pride, Duma
Duma (film)
Duma is a 2005 drama adventure film, directed by Carroll Ballard. It stars Alexander Michaletos, Eamonn Walker, Hope Davis and Campbell Scott...
, Racing Stripes
Racing Stripes
Racing Stripes is a 2005 comedy film directed by Frederik Du Chau, the director of Quest for Camelot. Although set in Kentucky, the movie was filmed in Pietermaritzburg and Nottingham Road, South Africa.-Plot:...
, Tsotsi
Tsotsi
Tsotsi is a 2005 film written and directed by Gavin Hood. The film is an adaptation of the novel Tsotsi, by Athol Fugard. The soundtrack features Kwaito music performed by popular South African artist Zola as well as a score by Mark Kilian and Paul Hepker featuring the voice of South African...
and The Constant Gardener
The Constant Gardener
The Constant Gardener is a 2001 novel by John le Carré. It tells the story of Justin Quayle, a British diplomat whose activist wife is murdered...
Emmanuelle started writing again, culminating in her returning from 2007 to her first love of jazz and has been working with her band ever since, performing at venues across the UK and Europe, writing and singing her own material as well as original arrangements of the classic American Songbook.
In 2010 she released her first solo jazz album Orry as a collaboration of her own BuckOrrLinDill and Splashpoint records.
Discography
- 1987:
Cry Freedom
Cry Freedom is a 1987 British drama film directed by Richard Attenborough, set in the late 1970s, during the apartheid era of South Africa. It was written from a screenplay by John Briley based on a pair of books by journalist Donald Woods...
The Millennium Bell
The Millennium Bell is the 20th record album by Mike Oldfield, released in 1999 . The theme of the album is a reflection of different periods of human history. The album borrows its name from the dawning of the 3rd millennium and Oldfield's Tubular Bells series of albums...
Racing Stripes
Racing Stripes is a 2005 comedy film directed by Frederik Du Chau, the director of Quest for Camelot. Although set in Kentucky, the movie was filmed in Pietermaritzburg and Nottingham Road, South Africa.-Plot:...
Duma (film)
Duma is a 2005 drama adventure film, directed by Carroll Ballard. It stars Alexander Michaletos, Eamonn Walker, Hope Davis and Campbell Scott...
Tsotsi
Tsotsi is a 2005 film written and directed by Gavin Hood. The film is an adaptation of the novel Tsotsi, by Athol Fugard. The soundtrack features Kwaito music performed by popular South African artist Zola as well as a score by Mark Kilian and Paul Hepker featuring the voice of South African...