Ángel Ng, the young Angelina, daughter of Mexican immigrant parents, who grew up singing among mariachis and who discovered her powerful soprano voice as a child, found a second vocation during the pandemic, clinical sciences.
Before the health contingency, Ángel traveled the world singing opera in the great theaters of Europe. But the unexpected arrival of covid – 19 turned her life around, forcing her to pause her singing to focus on helping the sick.
“When the pandemic broke out, I was back in California. He had just auditioned to go to a conservatory in Chicago; and I had a door trip to Poland and Austria, but it was all canceled. It was as if the world had collapsed. ”
Angel was born in Los Angeles 20 years. His parents are Mexican, graduated as doctors in Mexico. Like many immigrants, they came to the United States in search of a better life.
Her real name is Angie Villela, but she says she owes her stage name Ángel Ng to the mariachis.
“ They always called me Angel or Angelita. So I decided to leave Angel and Ng for the letters of my real name ”.
The love for music was born to her since she was a child and Upon hearing the mariachi, she fell in love with them.
Later her parents enrolled her in violin classes with teacher Leticia Callela.
She stepped on her first stage at 8 years. And she doesn’t even know how she had the courage to do it because she says she was very shy. “In the house it was the mute. He hardly spoke. ”
But when he began to practice and sing with the mariachi, he says that his shyness disappeared to give way to his voice of soprano.
The soprano is the highest female voice in opera and has the highest register of the human voice.
When I already had 11 years she told herself that she wanted to learn to sing well in Spanish with vocal technique.
“My parents made an effort to get me into the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music (The Colburn School of Performing Arts).”
But best of all, she was offered a scholarship and became a one of the first Latinas to be accepted into the renowned music school.
“I just finished studying this year. I was at the conservatory for 8 years. ”
And he still remembers that his first steps in mariachi music were given to the 12 years.
“At the same time that she was studying opera, she was highly sought after by mariachis. The Mariachi Divas, the Mariachi Sol de México, the Mariachi Nuevo Tecalitlán and the Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán began to pull me to their stages. ”
To the 15 years, began to participate in opera competitions; and to the 19 years she was invited to give opera classes in Peru and Cuba.
“In 2019 I was in Turkey, Russia and Bulgaria participating in different opera works such as Elíxir de Amor. I also studied with the soprano Korean Sumi jo and I had Mark Tucker, Armando Piña and Fabio Armilianto as opera teachers. ”
Angel says that he has never had to pay to travel to sing opera. “When they haven’t paid me, they cover all my expenses,” he says. And she clarifies that it has been the school that has proposed her to travel to different countries in the world.
“I am very grateful to my parents who have given me this opportunity and to the mariachis because I grew up with them” .
It has also been her maternal grandmother who has accompanied her on all her trips. “I have invited her so that she too knows and enjoys those places. My grandmother now has 80 years. ”
When the pandemic paralyzed the country, Ángel says it was as if the world had collapsed.
“I locked myself in my house. Thank God my dad didn’t miss work. He was a doctor in Mexico and here he is a laboratory clinician. So he was very busy. ”
However, he says that his fellow musicians fell into depression and despair due to not having a job and not being able to share with the people. “Events were held for Zoom, but it was not the same.”
Ángel says that when he found himself unable to sing on stage, he took the opportunity to finish high school online and obtain two certifications, one as an assistant doctor and another laboratory.
“I began to work in different hospitals, in the line of battle against covid- 19 and I It was time to enter in December, when the rebound in cases was at the highest with 600 patients per day. ”
Specifically, he says that part of his work consisted of doing covid tests.
“It was very heavy because we had to lose mariachis, musicians who baptized me at the beginning of my career, and many loved ones.”
Although he could not step on a stage during the pandemic, he says he has satisfaction to contribute and make an impact on people’s lives.
With the health crisis under some control, Ángel says that he continues to work part-time, but he is also in the first semester of a degree in clinical science and chemical engineering at Cal State Domínguez Hills.
But music is something that runs in his veins and he does not intend to abandon it. Besides singing in six languages, she plays the violin and piano.
“I am very lucky. Events are already being reactivated. I was singing at the Hollywood Forerever Cemetery for the Day of the Dead. To go to other countries and sing on stage, it will take 2 to 6 months. It is too early to make that decision ”.
In some way, he thanks the pandemic because without this crisis, he considers that he would not have focused on achieving two health certifications, nor would he have helped patients.
“I want to continue helping, but also continue singing opera and mariachi. That happiness of singing and making people happy when I get on stage, no one takes it away from me. at Hollywood Forever Cemetery and see people happy.
of my singing to the children and people we have lost. ”
And he talks that he went to sing at Hollywood Forever voluntarily, since he had no pay.
Her biggest dream is to contribute her music and voice to great causes, but she also wants to pursue a career in clinical science and chemical engineering to help others.