'My voice belongs to God'

An opera singer describes how she conquered a poor voice and stage fright.

by Kim Shippey

In First Grade, Heidi Skok had a low, gravelly, ugly voice. No one could have guessed that she'd one day be a singer—least of all that she would one day perform at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where she has just completed her tenth season.

"It was a real concern to my first school teachers," she says, "but not to my parents, who would say, 'Haven't you heard Carol Channing's voice?'"

As a young child, Heidi had always wanted to sing, and she practiced by singing to the animals on her parents' farm. When her parents arranged for her to take lessons, gradually her voice strengthened. The gravel thinned out and went away.

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