Gabriela Francesca
Hollywood, CA | Established. Jan 01, 2011
Music
Press
Vocalist Gabriela Francesca of Palatine was named the winner of the 2013 edition of Suburban Chicago's Got Talent, while vocalist Andrew Johnston of Bourbonnais was voted the online "Fan Favorite" on Saturday at the Taste of Arlington Heights.
Francesca, an 18-year-old student studying at Berklee College of Music in Boston, wins an expenses-paid trip to audition for producers of NBC-TV's "America's Got Talent."
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"I am so grateful," Francesca said after the announcement. "I'm really proud that I'll get to represent suburban Chicago at auditions for 'America's Got Talent.'"
Francesca was among nearly 100 contestants who went through Suburban Chicago's Got Talent general auditions in June. The finalists then were narrowed down through Sunday performances at the Metropolis Performing Arts Centre in Arlington Heights — from a top 30 on June 23 and July 7, to a top 16 (upped from 15 due to a scoring tie) on July 21, to the final 10 on Aug. 4.
Francesca consistently won over the judges and audiences, who voted at the live rounds of competition in the summer-long competition presented by the Daily Herald, produced by the Metropolis Performing Arts Centre and sponsored by the Arlington Heights Chamber of Commerce.
Each of the top 10 finalists performed again Saturday at the Taste of Arlington Heights, many choosing new numbers and songs for the outdoor crowd. The scoring was based on cumulative numerical ranking among the judges at each live performance round and by those audiences in attendance — who had a 20 percent say in the voting. But competitors' final performances at the Taste of Arlington Heights factored into the ultimate decision.
"Some of the contestants really raised their game, and what they did was even better than what they've done before," said Metropolis Executive Director Charlie Beck, who was part of a judging panel that included College of DuPage director of theater Connie Canaday Howard, Metropolis music director Micky York and Daily Herald writer Barbara Vitello, who reviews theater. Metropolis Education Director Michelle Shaver served as host.
"I didn't know that you had those extra two octaves in you," said York, giving feedback after Francesca's 1980s flashback cover performance singing the late Whitney Houston's "I Wanna Dance with Somebody." "We're always looking for artists who have star quality, and you have that." - Daily Herald
Discography
Still working on that hot first release.
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Bio
Gabriela Francesca is a singer, songwriter and performer born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. She lived in the Chicagoland suburbs for 18 years before packing up her songwriting notebooks, black acoustic guitar and impressive shoe collection and moving to Boston to attend the prestigious Berklee College of Music on a talent-based scholarship. With hard work and dedication, Gabriela graduated Berklee with a degree in Professional Music and a minor in Drama in just three years, at only 20 years old.
Now, at 21 and living in LA, Gabriela has already built an impressive resume and gained significant buzz as a performer and songwriter. Her electrifying performance energy, undeniable vocal prowess and fierce stage confidence has assisted her in that. She's performed from an arena in Bucharest, Romania to the Hard Rock Cafe Chicago; from The Red Room in Boston, MA to the main stage at the famous Viper Room in West Hollywood, CA.
Gabriela is not only a captivating performer, but also a skilled songwriter. She dominates the pop genre, writing songs in a breadth of sub-styles, such as electro-pop, pop/rock and pop/funk. Her influences include, but are not limited to, Sia, Marina and the Diamonds, Ne-Yo, Gwen Stefani and Cher Lloyd. Her writing versatility has opened several doors for her, including pitching an original song for Demi Lovato and tracking one of her originals with Miles Walker (engineer to Beyonce, Rihanna, Wiz Khalifa, Fifth Harmony and more). Gabriela has released an EP and two singles that are distributed widely on the web. Because of her love of all creative media, Gabriela serves on her music video sets as concept director, wardrobe supervisor and her own hair and makeup artist!
Gabriela's dreams include writing and singing a song that hits the BillBoard Hot 100 Charts, performing at Lollapalooza Music Festival in her home city of Chicago, and working with music legends like Major Lazer, Kygo, Pharrell Williams, Timbaland, Sean Paul and Pitbull.
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