Julie Andrews
Summary Julie Andrews was born Julia Elizabeth Wells on 1 October 1935 in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey. She is a born natural at performing, and she loves the stage. She made her first stage appearance at the very young age of two, as a fairy. Her aunt, Joan worked for dancing school where her mother, Barbara provided piano accompaniment for classes and performances, and her father, Ted made the stage sets. It was all too natural for her to come to be on the stage. Due to her mother’s stage ambitions for her, she was home taught and as her father was a teacher, it became convenient. World War II broke out when Julie was four, and her father volunteered for the Royal Air Force. Her parents soon separated and Barbara fell in love with another man, Ted Andrews, who was part of a traveling concert group that Barbara was a part of. Although Julie’s father was awarded custody of her and her brother, he signed Julie over to her mother because he recognized her talent and he knew that he was not in a position to get her into the business, and her mother and new stepfather were able to do this. After losing these two precious family members, her mother moved them into a house in London. When Blitzes would light up the sky, the little family (by this time she had another brother, Donald) would run to the subway station and stay underground until it was over, since their home did not have a basement. Eventually her mother was able to afford a ground flat, which had a basement air raid shelter. It seemed that every time she came to a more stable environment, another air raid would happen and she would lose her sense of security. It was in this basement that her voice was discovered. Her parents would sing to pass the time during the air raids, and one night Julie was heard singing an octave above that of her stepfather. Julie was taken to a singing coach, who discovered she had a three octave range, very strange for a girl at the age of nine.
Bibliography: Stirling, Richard. Julie Andrews an Intimate Biography. New York: St. Martin’s Press 2007