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I was thrilled as a kid to point out my sister as she danced and sang on the stage, and she was pretty good artistically. She was a great inspiration to me. She was the one who sort of led me into show business.

I was a little girl who grew up idolizing musical-theatre stars.

My older sisters were in acting, and of course, I wanted to be just like them!

Ever since I was really little, I loved performing and being up on stage, and being the entertainment.

I look at the careers of people I'm standing on the shoulders of. People like Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Sammy Davis Jr., and Sarah Vaughan. These are icons I wanted to emulate, and I feel like they've been holding me up for quite a long time.

My background was always more soulful pop. I was named after Ella Fitzgerald, and when I was a kid, I was listening to Lauryn Hill, Etta James, Joss Stone. For me, it was always about the voice.

Growing up with Jennifer Lopez and Salma Hayek - people who were always trying to do something else - I wanted to follow in their footsteps. They gave people a different perspective of how women were supposed to look like and be.

I grew up listening to Bernadette Peters, Patti LuPone, and Angela Lansbury, so I grew up wanting to sound like Patti and Bernadette. What I realized, though, is that I can't sound like that, and what makes their performances magical is their uniqueness.

I wanted to sing when I was little. That's what I liked doing. It didn't occur to me that you became famous or anything like that.