Singing sensation
“We did our first gig at the start of the year and have performed at venues such as Jazzlab and Paris Cat Jazz Club [in Melbourne]. All our shows have sold out,” she said.
Jemma Cher is enjoying a new chapter in her singing career as she performs with a new backing band at gigs at popular Melbourne jazz venues.
The former student of Mount Scopus Memorial College demonstrated her talent at an early age – it was at the 2012 Yom Ha’atzmaut concert held at the National Theatre, St Kilda that she first performed before a packed audience and realised she wanted to become a singer.
Since then Cher has won prizes in singing competitions and at the B’nai B’rith Jewish Youth Eisteddfod, and earned scholarships from her school to study music.
However, the extended COVID-19 lockdowns in Melbourne, which devastated the entertainment industry, brought her career to a halt.
“When I graduated from Mount Scopus in 2018, I had this vision that opportunities would just appear in my direction, but of course that doesn’t really happen, and then COVID hit,” Cher told The AJN.
“Until then I had been working in the field for almost for seven years and had built a bit of a name for myself in the community. But when COVID came there were no more gigs, and after COVID lockdowns were over I had to almost start from scratch again.”
Cher is currently studying for her Bachelor of Music degree at the Australian College of the Arts in Melbourne and since the start of this year has focused on the launch of her band, which comprises Simon Starr on double bass, keyboardist Ben Grayson, drummer Daniel Farrugia and Joshua Moshe on woodwind. At some concerts they are joined by drummer Hugh Harvey.
“We did our first gig at the start of the year and have performed at venues such as Jazzlab and Paris Cat Jazz Club [in Melbourne]. All our shows have sold out,” she said.
“Every show is almost two hours with an intermission and featuring 14-18 songs. I love to sing jazz, soul and R&B, but I like all styles of music, so there is a mixture in our shows.
“Often I will take a pop song and ensure that the audience at a jazz venue is connected to it. It can range from Nina Simone and Nancy Sinatra to Judith Durham and Dusty Springfield. It’s important to cover a variety of tastes as the age group of audiences varies a lot, so the music needs to speak to everyone.”
Cher said that in her early years – she was a student at Melbourne’s Leibler Yavneh College for primary school – she loved sport and competed in swimming, soccer, tennis and running.
“I was that kid that wanted to do everything and was in all the sports competitions and thought I may become a professional runner,” she recalled.
“That was until I discovered my voice – and once I discovered I had a singing voice, I started getting lessons. My maternal grandfather, Ever Mimun, encouraged me to sing and said I had an amazing voice.
“After the Yom Ha’atzmaut concert my parents realised that singing was something that I loved to do and organised singing lessons.”
One of her big breaks was in 2014 when Cher entered the National Reconciliation Week Sing Loud competition and won the best cover category for her version of Robert Beattie’s Time to Get Serious.
“It was a really important part of my career and special for me at that age to create a piece about reconciliation,” she said.
“I learnt how to be artistic and do more than just sing a cover and also made a video. It helped me determine that I wanted to have a career in music.”
The competition was judged by singers Delta Goodrem and Gurrumul and the winner received a $1000 prize.
“Even though I was only 13, I had learnt so much about reconciliation and what it meant. It was important to me because I wasn’t singing just for the sake of singing, but for something that was significant,” she said.
“$1000 was a lot of money and I decided to put half towards my musical development though singing lessons, and donate half to an Indigenous organisation under Reconciliation Australia.”
Cher’s success over the years included the B’nai B’rith Jewish Youth Music Eisteddfod finals concerts in 2014 and 2015, winning the vocal contemporary category in her age group, and reaching the semi-finals of the Rob Guest Endowment award in 2018.
Between 2015 and 2018 Cher received Performing Arts scholarships from Mount Scopus to continue studying music at the school and also won the college’s performing arts award in 2018.
“As a student I was taking music very seriously and getting involved in the music scene with competitions, so it was nice that I was being recognised for my abilities,” she said.
For the past year Cher has also been writing musical arrangements with Starr and is keen to build her career, adding that she is not in a rush to perform overseas.
“I want to be known as an Australian artist.”
For information on Jemma Cher’s upcoming gigs, visit jemmacher.com
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