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Des'ray singles
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Des'ray biographyDesirée Claudette Manders aka Des'ray is the singer and frontwoman of the 2 Brothers on the 4th floor project. She was born on October, 28th 1969 in 's Gravenhage. her family moved to Hoeven in Brabant when she was 6 years old. She lived there during her school period : that's the time when she knew she wanted to become a singer. Each friday afternoon they had a 'celebration' on school where the little children did a performance. "My girl friends and I played a scene from the movie Grease with singing, dancing, changing clothes. You know, just to be the star of that day. In that time I learned to play my first tunes on the piano and I had flute lessons. In that time animals & music (especially singing) were my biggest hobby" she explains. Desirée grew up and at the age of 12 she did go to the M.A.V.O. in Oudenbosch. "That was a difficult time, because all my friend of school did go to the H.A.V.O. so I didn't see them anymore. When I finally did feel a little comfortable, we had to move again, this time to Limburg because of my father's work" she tells. The family settled in Horst-Meterk and Desirée was back again in a class where she didn't know anyone, and even didn't understand what they where saying. "Even when the teacher Dutch did read something to let us write down, I didn't know what he was talking about ! I was a lonely teenager, a Dutch one !!! Happily, the girls from the village - with whom I did ride to school on my bicycle - where very kind to me and bit by bit I did feel myself on my place and I did got some great girl friends. We did write complete books of pieces of paper to each other ! You know; down-under-the-table-pass-through-system" she remembers. A little later, Desirée joined the schoolband and took piano lessons on the music school, while working on her condition at the sportschool. "Beside this all, my dream became truth, I did got my own pony from my family ! Hiddy was her name and I joined the horse riding club. I that time I spend my day with going to school, make home work and horse riding. With a girl friend I did set up a small danceclub. We tried to imitate all the songs of the serie 'Fame' and on village afternoon we did gave a performance. (Also videoclips of Michael Jackson were a great inspiration)" Desirée says. Beside that Desirée had to sing in the church quere. The singing did go very well and a girl friend of her mother taught it was a great idea to write her in for a talent contest. "I was very unsure and nervous, 'cause singing for a big audience was a dream, a fantasy. But now when it really would happen, I was a bit frightnend. I was shaking on my legs and had to go to the toilet continuesly. The moment was there... I was singing Woman in Love of Barbara Streisand... and... while I sung my latest note, I run off the podium and backstage I heard a big applause and I ended with the 1st price. The first price was a perfomance on the yearly village party between other great artists from the neighourhood. Again a scary great performance !!! In Limburg a lot of party's where organized and ofcourse with a lot of music, so from one thing came another and I increased my skills with others of my favorite artists like Diana Ross, Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson and my father told me to take a look in the music library to search for other usefull numbers" she remembers. Music allways had played a big role in Desirée's family. Her father and mother both played the gituar (my father still does!!) and there was a piano in the house. And with family party's everone spend the night at our house and they made music. It was even a tradition to perform a show every year at the birthday of Desirée's grandmother and act like artist such as The Everly Brothers and Kate Bush. Because all kind of music styles where played at home like country and gipsy music she did grew up with all these kind of styles. After the M.A.V.O., Desirée went to the M.E.A.O. With the encourgement of her parents she often took part to talent contests with her father as "TourManager". In that time Henny Huisman did get famouse with the 'SounMixShow' and he did travel the country looking for talent. Desirée made it trough the first rounds and did my TV debute under the name of Anita Meyer with the song They Don't Play Our Love Song anymore. "I became 1st in place and made it trough the finals. It took me to the 3th place. Not bad, isn't it ?". At school it didn't go so well. Desirée didn't spend many time anymore at school and decided this wasn't the right education for her. She followed a education as beauty specialist of three year. She had more time left to do what she preferred, singing ! Because of the SoundMixShow she got to know more people from the 'music scene'. She performed a lot in discos and company parties, and did her first TV perfomance at Frank Masmeyer. "In the mean while there where made big plans about my carrere, nevertheless I've been on television and was known as 'The Anita Meyer of the SoundMixShow'. The only problem was that I looked too much like Anita Meyer, so we had to come up with something different". She contributed to a duo called TOTB (meaning "Totaly Organized Trendy Bobbers", with singer Nando van Heiningen, The "George Benson" of the SoundMixShow). She did also had my own fanclub, just like the other artists of the SoundMixShow. In that time she met Martin Boer. He mixed the duo's first single The Best of My Love. Desirée and Martin became good friends. The single made it to the TipParade, what was a lot that time and TOTB visited a lot of radioprograms. The second and last single was Rap Around The World which never came out. It didn't go very well for TOTB so they decided to split up and Desirée went solo again. In the meanwhile the end of her education for beautyspecialist was in sight. She did solo performances, for instance on a boat which shipped between England & The Netherlands. There she did get in contact with musicians who gave lessons on several conservatoria : they adviced her to do auditions. She thought 'This ain't something for me. This will never work". However, she tried and was admitted to study on the conservatorium in Hilversum. Her great wish to get into music became reality. Desirée had to do all kind of jobs to keep herself supported. With sometimes only ten guilders left in a week, she was studying notes. "The conservatorium time was stormy and I learned a lot from other collegues and good friends. It was a time where I did get more mature and surely of myself. Most of all my value as singer. I did graduate with a exame to be proud of and that counts also for the people I did get to know during my study". Desirée still had contact with Martin Boer. In 1993 Martin and Bobby asked her to sing vocal part of a song. It would also contain rap, since they knew a good rapper. A little later, Desirée met him for the first time in the studio. His name was Renee Philips (D-Rock), and Desirée's artist name would become Des'Ray. Together we would become the face of the 2 Brothers on the 4th Floor. The first song was named Never Alone. First everyone saw this as a project. There came some dancers and on January 1st 1994 they had their first performance together. "I'll never forget this; we didn't have enough to perfom on stage. So, we put up a show of 25-30 minutes with 3 times Never Alone in it ! We looked awefull ! Renee in his Jeans and I with my gathered artist-outfit. Because we didn't knew each other really good, we talked trough each other and the big disaster when a dancer broke his feet". But Never Alone did became a great hit and immediatly made it to #2. After this they had some highlights like Dreams which stayed 2 weeks #1. After 5 years together, Renee and Desirée had become like sister and brother. "We shared some love and hate. Together with Martin and Bobby we became a real close team, which is something not a lot of people could say". After 2 albums and a lot of hits, the 2 Brothers on the 4th Floor were gradually losing popularity. Desirée started again doing solo appearances or to collaborate with other artists. 1999 : Herman Brood, a Dutch singer, performed a song together with Des'ray and Nance. The three did Here There And Everywhere from the Beatles. This song could be seen on Dutch television at the end of November on La La La Live! 2002 : Des'ray joined Anita Doth (former vocalist of 2 Unlimited) and Linda Estelle (from T-Spoon) for a a one time project called Divas Of Dance. They will do remakes of old songs, but they will also do hitmixes of their greatest hits in their shows. She also created her production company Soul Made Music with his "soulmate" Jeroen, and is presenting a new show : Natural Woman - A tribute to Aretha Franklin. A mix of soul and classic dance... Des'Ray created the project Killer Queen along with 3 other artists : Laura Vlasblom, Linda Caminita and Lisa Noya (former Haddaway background vocalist). The project is produced by Des'ray's label Soul Made Music. They sing new versions of Queen's biggest hits and a part of the benefits will be ceded to the AIDS fund. 2004 : Des'ray is still with Divas Of Dance. She performed a duet with Laura Vlasblom as Back To Waterloo (ABBA). She moved to a new house in May. 2006 : on 15 July, Des'ray & Friends were guests in on the blues festival in Bellingwolde. Des'ray's solo jazz album is ready, it will be released in September. D-rock and Des'ray are still doing performances in Holland. They are speaking with a record company to make a 2 Brothers DVD or maybe a best of CD. Nothing has been confirmed yet. 2007 : Des'Ray's new album is called Des'Ray Classics. It's a compilation including all Des'ray's favourite jazz tunes. 2008 : Des'ray also works as musical coach. She developed a musical Body & Mind workshop called "Sing-go". 2009 : DesRay herself is still singing old classics with her band under the name DesRay & Friends. She likes soul and jazz music and performs live hits like Beautiful Day, All Night Long, Time After Time and Somewhere Over The Rainbow. Her next concert will be on May 3rd in Gooiland te Hilversum. DesRay had also recorded two dance tracks : I Want It All (by Queen) and Respect (by Aretha Franklin) and still takes parts in the bands Diva's Of Dance and Killer Queen 2010 : Des'ray released a single entitled What About You to support the welfare cause "Samen voor éen better leven in Soedan" to bring help to South Sudan. She was vocal coach in the real-TV series Sterren.nl Academie 2010. 2011 : Des'ray is still involved in welfare actions to help Sudan. She is a member of the Sing That Song project. 2012 : Des'ray is among the candidates to Dutch real-TV show The Winner Is on SBS 6. Des'Ray Manders InterNet FanClub The biography was last updated Mon, December 24th 2012 Did you like this article ? Tell your friends
Latest Des'ray news08/03/2012 : Des'ray won the 3rd round again Lilian Day Jackson. She is the last The Winner Is candidate remaining in the professionals category. 04/02/2012 : Last Thursday, Des'ray won the first round of The Winner Is on SBS 6. She sung River Deep, Mountain High. Congratulations, Des'ray ! 24/01/2012 : Des'ray is among the candidates to Dutch real-TV show The Winner Is on SBS 6. More infos here 29/08/2011 : Des'ray (2 Brothers on the 4th Floor vocalist) contributes to the Sing That Song project to help Sudan. More infos here 20/08/2002 : Des'ray from 2 Brothers has gone solo with a project called Soul Made Music. Links to Des'rayOfficial websites
DISCLAIMER : unless you see the artist's name among the credits of this biography, it was only created by gathering infos from the web and from fan sources. Sorry if, even if I did all verifications I could, some parts of the biography are false or lack accuracy. If you are the artist himself or contributed to the project, please wait till I come back from holidays.
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