JACKIE MARIE AS DIANA ROSS TRIBUTE

Biography
Jackie Marie has been performing all over the county for a number of years.

She has had a varied career in the entertainment and media world but always had a passion for music.

Jackie Marie has worked on television as an extra in ‘The Upper Hand”and appeared in the “Peak Practice” as a Doctor and a Nurse on several occasions thanks to the casting agency called Denman based in Nottingham. She was asked to do a speaking part to which she panicked and couldn’t get the words out due to her stutter. Jackie Marie joked with the producers and said “if you had asked me to sing the lines I would have been okay“

Over the year’s the stutter has improved a lot and luckily for me people don’t notice it, but at school it was terrible and singing was so easy I just kept on singing. It was at Primary School where Jackie Marie realised she had a talent for singing when her Music Teacher said openly in front of the whole class …”one little girl has a really beautiful voice and you can sing”. The Teacher looked directly at the young Jackie Marie and did not pursue a career in this field as she was told by her mum to pursue a ‘real job’ instead.

Even though Jackie Marie was facing a broken marriage with two young children and not having any extra money to buy the equipment she decided to hire the equipment and with what little was left over was able to buy second hand equipment – which didn’t sound very good and it was a start and certainly better than feeling ripped off by the band.

After several more years and raising a family and having a successful career in teaching, Jackie Marie always sang at the weekends performing a mixture of Soul, Motown and Pop. Jackie Marie has had many repeat bookings and enjoyed performing at Weddings, Festivals, Clubs, Pubs and Cabarets all over the Country. Within just a year Jackie was voted the best female singer on the circuit and won the award in 2008 and performed 3 songs to a packed audience at Scallywags, has performed with the American Motown Show, Joe Longthorn, Ray Lewis and The Batchelors.

She was in a band performing original music mostly reggae and after a few weeks was sacked from the band because she was told that she sounds too much like Bjork. Although this was a kick in the teeth and dreams shattered again. Jackie Marie decided to throw herself into her teaching career and was promoted to Head of Department without really trying. Still frustrated with her singing career she decided when she met her late husband Tony to branch out more. We finally managed our first holiday and went to Cornwall for the week. “We went on holiday with my then two young children Zakkai and Francesca and I saw these singers on stage and I was mesmerised by them to be honest and as well as enjoying the entertainment thought, “I could do this…I know I can”. Tony helped Jackie Marie with song choices and ideas etc and pushed her to try singers with strong voices such as Tina Turner and M People….and the story begins.

Despite her success and popularity on the circuit and always having a full diary, Jackie Marie still felt that something was missing and it was suggested to her to try her hand at Tribute Work. This was difficult as most of the acts she liked were Rihanna, Jessie J, Beyonce. There were already plenty of pop tributes around and finding a tribute act was proving difficult especially as there were a lot of tribute acts on the circuit.

Jackie then decided to try her hand at 3 different tribute acts M People, Alicia Keys and Diana Ross. There were already successful Diana Ross Tribute Acts “so I thought I would strike lucky with M People and Alicia Keys”. Luckily Jackie Marie got a lot of work with doing the tribute act and combining her tributes made the shows more interesting, but she always felt in the back of her mind that although the applause and many compliments were great I took it all with a pinch of salt and continued my frustrating journey as deep down I really wanted to do my own material”

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“I recall people laughing about Taylor Swift…they kept saying stuff like I suppose that song will be about another one of her ex boyfriends etc etc..which gave me the idea to write about real events in my life rather than trying to make it up and somehow it all seemed a lot easier. Jackie Marie then decided to write lyrics and notes and continued to enter competitions and getting close and again narrowly missing out on the lives again was a frustrating experience. “I thought enough is enough “ She had tried to collaborate with other writers and musicians but never getting anywhere so I had to go it alone. Luckily technology has changed and evolved so much it has enabled me to put music together, I had some piano lessons so I play some chords, but by no means an expert so with the help of technology produced some great sounds and the melodies came easier than ever”

At the moment things are looking good for Jackie Marie and her music has been aired on at least 6 Radio Stations including BBC Radio which is having a fantastic trickling effect as other radio stations are playing her music. These include: Radio Nova, chaaawaaa.com, The Thread FM 102.8 currently playing all 3 songs every other day, Cannock Chase Radio, Jazz Juice Radio

Jackie Marie has also worked on Radio as an outside broadcaster for her local radio station, which is now called Capital FM. At the time it was called Trent Fm and Radio Trent. She also took part in an advert for Abbey National Commercial using a green screen and then went on to appear in “My Kind of Music” and sang openly in front of her first big crowd at the Whitgift Shopping Centre. Thoroughly enjoying the experience of it she decided to pursue her dream.

In her past, Jackie Marie tried to get into the music industry by singing and performing in a bands but she always felt that there was always something missing and after the break up of her first marriage, she decided to go it alone, entered competitions and always missing out on the top 3. Since Jackie Marie couldn’t play any instruments it was difficult to be creative and write my own songs although I had lots of ideas and melody lines I wasn’t able to do anything with it. Jackie Marie couldn’t really afford to have piano lessons so she tried to join a band that played original music, but they were only interested in her singing their songs and covers and she was told that there was no money to make as an original artiste and then decided to do covers with the band singing Dolly Parton, her first ever song with the band was called Jolene, she sang several songs and learnt them quick with the other girl in the band who was already a seasoned singer on the circuit. “Good songs but I felt frustrated” . Any song that Jackie suggested was “rubbished” and therefore I didn’t really have a voice so after about 5 gigs and the fact that the roadie was getting more money than the two female singers in the band she decided to leave the band as there wasn’t much money in it and having to pay babysitters who became unreliable and missing out on band practice and having to each pay a portion of their money to the Roadie and paying every week for new leads etc etc she felt that it was better to “go it alone