MONICA OTT : BIO
Growing up in Baltimore, MD in a household where posters of different musicals decorated the walls, Monica Ott was destined for a life in the arts. At age six, she attended Camp Debut, a musical theater camp that put on two shows a summer. Monica was usually cast in the chorus, but that didn’t stop her from auditioning for the lead every year. One summer, she finally got her first singing solo when she was cast as the part of Mighty Mouse in newly written musical about cartoons. She was so excited, but unfortunately she had to pull out of the play because it coincided with a family vacation to the Poconos. Feeling discouraged, Monica didn’t try out for another play until highschool. She did, however, spend many hours in her room singing various Disney songs especially ones from “Beauty and the Beast” and “Aladdin”. Monica rarely sung in front of people so she was pleasantly surprised after her Bat-Mitzvah when her rabbi said that her singing of her torah portion was one of the best renditions he'd ever heard. Having a newly found confidence from becoming an "adult" in the jewish faith, Monica left her life of Disney behind, and began spending a lot of time with her dad's Beatles collection, which ultimately led her to learn how to play the guitar.
Upon the arrival of her fourteenth birthday, Monica’s parents surprised her with a shiny new fire-engine red Fender guitar. From then on, she took guitar lessons, but quickly pushed the material aside in favor of playing and writing her own songs. This became a way to relieve the growing pains of highschool and still being cast in the chorus. Once she graduated, Monica traded in her electric for an acoustic guitar and attended Muhlenberg College where she met her dear friend and fellow musician Amy Schendel Miller. Together they formed MonAmie and harmoniously sang and played for people all over campus. Still not considering herself a singer and still being cast in the chorus, Monica was encouraged by her peers who consistently said that she should keep writing more songs. Monica was inspired to not only write songs for herself, but to write songs in order to make people feel something when they listened to her music. Having her share of breakups and heartache didn’t hurt the writing process either. When graduation arrived, Monica was one hundred percent sure that she was going to pursue her music and drop theater for good. And that’s what she did.
Monica moved to NYC in 2004 and started playing gigs and open mic nights. About a year later, Monica started feeling discouraged about her lack of progress in the music world. It wasn’t until she met Tina Shafer, one of NYC's top vocal coaches (Vanessa Carlton, Avril Lavigne) who helped Monica evolve her music into a style that’s fresh, new, and a little unrecognizable. Monica quickly became part of the NYC Songwriter’s Circle and was a regular performer at their showcases. She also met her bandmates along the way Joe Bonadio (Marc Cohn), Jeff Allen (Suzanne Vega), and Marc Shulman (Jewel) who introduced her to recording engineer Robert L. Smith (Rickie Lee Jones) of Defy Recordings. Together they created her debut album “Only Human.” Monica’s friend from college, Amy also returned to sing harmonies on the album. Already garnering some attention for her song “Perfect Circle, Monica received an honorable mention in the 2008 Songwriter’s Circle contest by beating out thousands of entries. Today, she is featured on the NYC Songwriter's Circle "Best of - Volume One" compilation CD that will be released nationally, Fall 2009. Monica continues to play at venues in NYC with hopes of touring in the future. Meanwhile, she is still writing choruses, but will not likely be in another chorus anytime soon.