Leah LaBelle

Leah LaBelle, born Leah Vladowski on 8 September 1986 in Toronto, Canada, was the only child of Troshan and Anastasia Vladowski. Troshan and Anastasia, musicians and immigrants to the United States, defected from communist Bulgaria during a tour of Western Europe in 1979 at the height of success with such Bulgarian pop music groups as Sreburnite Grivni and Tonika. LaBelle graduated from Garfield High School in Seattle, Washington in 2005 and later attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. LaBelle has been performing, singing and dancing, publicly since 1990 but marks 1993 as the start of her pursuit of a music career. In 1997, LaBelle won the Washington State Pre-teen Miss America Pageant and was 1st runner-up in the National Pageant. In 1998 she joined the nationally acclaimed Total Experience Gospel Choir and can be heard in several recordings with the group and as part of the Langston Hughes musical, Black Nativity over the following five years. In 2000, LaBel