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| Miss america susan powell |
The only daughter of Vinita and Wendell Powell grew up in the western Oklahoma town of Elk City, a small farming and ranching community not far from the Texas state line.
Music was an integral part of the family's life, and Susan developed a love for it at a very young age. Even then, she rarely needed encouragement to perform.
"I can remember being really little and singing at my grandmother's house," Powell said recently. "I'd stand on a hassock with anything I could find for a microphone. It didn't seem weird to me then, but now, looking back on it, it was rather strange."
Powell would later study piano and play the trumpet in her school band, something she would continue in college. At 15, she began studying music with Florence Birdwell at Oklahoma City University.
She and her mother would make the two-hour trip every Tuesday. The many hours they spent together driving to and from Oklahoma City strengthened what had already been a strong bond.
In addition to music, Powell discovered she had a natural affinity for the theater, and, thanks to a thriving community theater in Elk City, she was frequently cast.
"My first role was the little girl in 'South Pacific,' and I also played Snoopy in 'Charlie Brown' there," Powell recalled. "My big part was Eliza in 'My Fair Lady' when I was 15.
"It was a really great thing for a community to do, because it gave me a lot of focus. The essence of community theater is bringing a community together through art."
In high school, Powell also began to explore the pageant circuit. She won the Miss Elk City pageant in 1977 and was second runner-up in the Miss Oklahoma pageant the same year.
During her sophomore year at OCU, Powell entered the Miss Oklahoma City pageant and was named first runner-up. Disappointed by the outcome, she decided to finish college and move to New York. But her dad convinced her to give it one more try.
"I decided to enter every local pageant and ended up winning Miss Oklahoma City. That turned out to be a wonderful thing for me, because I met people that ultimately changed and shaped my life.
"It was really a banner year for me. I won the Metropolitan Opera auditions, I got the overall artist award that year at NATS (National Association of Teachers of Singing), and then I won Miss Oklahoma and finally Miss America."
For her talent segment, Powell chose the sparkling "Telephone Aria" from Gian Carlo Menotti's "The Telephone." Her rangy voice and vivid facial expressions made Powell a hit with judges and audience alike.
"As I recall, Susan's mother had heard the aria on television, and instantly we got a copy of the music and started working on it," said Birdwell, Powell's former voice teacher .
"We practiced for days with the feather boa that kept getting in her way, and she was just so funny trying to spit the boa out of her mouth so she could sing the high note. Ever since, I've felt that was Susan's aria, and I haven't wanted to teach it to anyone else."
After logging hundreds of thousands of miles and scores of personal appearances during her reign as Miss America, Powell crowned her successor and immediately headed to Seattle for a Seattle Opera production of "Die Fledermaus."
"I'd never really done a leading role except in community theater," Powell recalled. "It was a huge production that featured John Reardon, Buddy Hackett, Werner Klemperer and Paul Sorvino.
"But it was the beginning of a marvelous time in my career. People were so supportive, and immediately they offered me two more contracts. The next year I came back and did Micaela in 'Carmen.'"
Yet while classically trained, Powell wasn't interested solely in opera. She began auditioning for musical theater roles and soon landed the lead in a St. Louis MUNY production of "Promises, Promises."
Upon returning to New York, Powell became involved in a long run of "The Merry Widow" and subsequently was booked by Columbia Artists on their community concert series.
"That's back when Miss America really did perform her talent whenever she appeared," Powell said. "I bet I did at least 300 performances that year. I was singing every barn, every auditorium, every platform, every flatbed truck. That's training you can't get anywhere else."
New York became home to Powell after her reign as Miss America, and there was no shortage of work for the petite brunette: musicals, solo concerts, symphony orchestra appearances and an unexpected foray into television.
In 1992, she was asked to be the host of The Discovery Channel's "Home Matters," a top-rated cable network show that features segments about decorating, cooking, gardening and a variety of crafts projects.
"I don't pretend to be an expert in any of the areas we feature," Powell said. "My advantage was being able to ask questions. That's why I got the job in the first place.
"Now the network is putting pressure on me to be an expert. I think what makes me interesting is that I'm not Martha Stewart. But television being such an uncertain business, I don't know where things will go."
Thanks to her reign as Miss America and now her nine seasons as host of "Home Matters," Powell is often recognized wherever she goes. But on those rare visits to see her mother in Elk City, Powell is happy to leave the trappings of fame behind.
"She doesn't want to be anything but Susan when she comes here," her mother, Vinita, said. "She just likes to be herself, and most of the time she is. She's not someone who puts on airs. At home, she spends most of her time in jeans."
While television is Powell's primary focus today, she's grateful that the show's 12-week taping schedule allows her to pursue musical interests. Two years ago, she traveled with the Boston Pops for a Christmas tour and has performed with symphony orchestras in Utah, Oklahoma and Japan.
"Susan and I had worked together in Indianapolis about three years before I took over the Boston Pops," said Keith Lockhart, conductor of the Boston Pops. "I've always found her immensely appealing and so down to earth. In fact, she's far too normal to be a soprano or Miss America.
"When she did the Christmas show with us in 1999, I found it interesting that people knew her from 'Home Matters' but not as a vocalist. Then she'd come out and knock their socks off."
Such opportunities require Powell to keep her voice in shape, a challenge for someone with such a hectic schedule. But whenever she's in New York, she takes a voice lesson every week.
"It's not just about maintaining; it's what I'm passionate about and love," Powell said. "I meet people who don't have musical talent and always think what my life would have been like if I hadn't had this gift.
"It has been so wonderful to lean on it and know that it's such a source of eternal knowledge. You can't ever know all about it. The more you know, the more you realize you don't know.
"Music is wonderful that way. It is a world unto itself. Not only do I appreciate it, but I'm part of it, and I really love it. It's not just something that I do, it's kind of who I am."