Cher has one of the most powerful and iconic voices in pop music — but she’s revealed that ahead of recording her new holiday album, Christmas, she needed to take her pipes in for a tune-up.
“I haven’t sung in years. So I call my unbelievable teacher, Adrienne Angel, who I love like the sun and the moon,” Cher, 77, tells The New York Times. “She’s 96; she’s been my teacher since my 40s … I just wanted it to sound like my voice. I didn’t want to have to lower any keys. That’s always the dead giveaway.”
“My doctor said I have the vocal cords of a 25-year-old girl,” Cher adds. “I mean, look, you don’t usually have a very great voice at 77, right? But it seems like a lot of us are having some sort of resurgence. I don’t know what it is. Revenge of the old people.”
Old or not, Cher says she’s grateful to be able to do what she does. She recalls a conversation she had with Barbra Streisand when she was still touring. Barbra asked her, “Cher, why are you still doing this?” She says she replied, “Because there’s going to come a day where I can’t do it. And I don’t want to have thought that I could have done my art longer, and chose not to.”
Ironically, Cher says holiday songs aren’t front and center in her own Christmas celebrations.
“I don’t cook, but everyone ends up at my house … [w]e’ve got lots of kids around, and teenagers. Mostly we’re just talking and acting crazy and watching movies and hanging out,” she says. “We don’t put on, really, Christmas music, just fun music. But music doesn’t seem to be a large part of it. Everybody’s talking too loud.”
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