Ana Gasteyer Studied Opera At The Beginning Of Her Career

Hip Chick: Ana Gasteyer performing in her music video

Funny lady Ana Gasteyer appeared on Live with Kelly and Michael on October 1st to promote her new CD, I'm Hip. During the interview she disclosed that she wanted to be an opera singer when she was younger. Music was always in her background, starting with violin lessons at age five. Her passion shifted to singing and her first professional job was as a child ghost in Verdi's Macbeth when she was 13-years old. She attended Northwestern University with full intention of getting the training needed to live her dream. However, after arriving at college she started partaking in activities that she thought were not so becoming for that career choice. That is when she stopped singing opera. "...Gasteyer always had an ear for music and a knack for timing. Years later, after a formal education as a classically-trained singer, she made the fateful discovery that she could get people laughing—and laugh they did every Saturday night at NBC’s

Studio 8H. Audiences fell in love with Gasteyer’s flair for irony and character driven comedy on six seasons of SNL, where she unabashedly played, and often sang, at full-tilt. Eventually, Broadway came calling and Gasteyer spent several years belting out superstar vocals in shows like Wicked and Rocky Horror. But she felt most at home crooning and chirping with a big band in a nightclub, amidst laughter and the inviting clink of ice in a glass. Her acclaimed shows, Let it Rip and Elegant Songs from a Handsome Woman earned praise from audiences and critics alike who hailed the acts as 'exuberant and rollicking entertainment' with 'high-octane vocals' and 'a topnotch swingin’ ensemble.'" Her journey from Saturday Night Live to singing on Broadway stages is really quite remarkable. "Ana Gasteyer is best-known for her incomparable

work on Saturday Night Live (1975). During her six-year stint, she created some of the most famous SNL characters, including middle school music teacher 'Bobbie Moughan-Culp,' NPR radio host 'Margaret Jo,' Lilith Fair poetess 'Cinder Calhoun,' as well as spot-on impressions of Martha Stewart, Céline Dion and Hillary Rodham Clinton....On stage, she made her triumphant Broadway debut as Columbia in The Rocky Horror Show. Since then, Gasteyer earned raves as Elphaba in Wicked on Broadway & originated the role for the Chicago production, earning a Joseph Jefferson Award nomination. Other New York theater credits include the Tony-nominated Broadway productions of The Royal Family directed by Doug Hughes, The Threepenny Opera with Alan Cumming and Jim Dale, Eve Ensler's acclaimed off-Broadway hit, The Vagina Monologues, and Manhattan Theatre Club's hit production of Kimberly Akimbo, by celebrated playwright David Lindsay-Abaire. Ana also starred as Fanny Brice in Funny Girl at the Pittsburgh Civic Light Opera. Gasteyer starred to rave reviews as Fosca in Gary Griffin's production of Stephen Sondheim's Passion at The Chicago Shakespeare Theater, earning a

Joseph Jefferson Award nomination for her performance. She also co-starred in the one-night-only, star-studded Actors Fund benefit concerts of Funny Girl, Hair and A Centennial Celebration of Frank Loesser." Watch her performance of "One Mint Julep" on Live with Kelly and Michael by clicking here. You can purchase the digital version of the album here. More videos of the multi-talented Ana Gasteyer, after the jump. 
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