Carrie

Date of Birth: 17th August 1965

Carrie started dancing at the age of 2 and attended a free dance class twice a week organised by her local council. She left school after her O levels at 16 to persue a career in dancing on Top of the Pops.

In 1983 at the age of 17, Carrie sang with the group Sweet Dreams to represent the UK on the Eurovision song contest. The song, I'm never giving up came 6th and reached the chart position of 21 when it was released in the UK.

Carrie then moved into TV presenting and worked on shows such as How Dare You, Freeze Frame and Heart and Soul. It was when she was working on Saturday morning show Freeze Frame that she met David, who was performing on the show.

It was around the time of meeting David that Carrie was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a potentially life threatening condition that affects the digestive track. She has now lived with the disease for over 20 years. For more information see this article or visit the National Association for Colitis and Crohn's official website.

After TV presenting, Carrie moved into session singing, becoming one of the countries most respected and working with the likes of Diana Ross, Roberta Flack, Rod Stewart, Lighthouse Family and Fatboy Slim.

In the early nineties Carrie and David ran a full-time arts school in Notting Hill and around this time they also formed a duo act called Suga Shak with which they had a top five club record. In 1998 Carrie and David released a highly acclaimed gospel album, Watching and Waiting, which went on to win the MOBO award for best gospel album.

Carrie followed this with vocal coaching and producing, working with artists such as Take That, Melanie C, S Club 7, Atomic Kitten, Lemar, Vanessa Mae, Emma Bunton and Charlotte Church. It was this reputation as top vocal coaches that landed Carrie and David the job of vocal coaches on the first series of Pop Idol. They then went on to work on BBC's Fame Academy and Comic Relief Does Fame Academy which has made them both household names across the country. The couple still continue thier coaching, working with various celebs and upcoming stars.

Carrie & David are also involved in business management training, interactively using voice to work on leadership strategy, change management and team building.

Recently Carrie has worked as a presenter on The Heaven & Earth Show and The Mint. Suprisingly to everyone, she took part in the reality tv show Safari School, where she spent 6 weeks in Africa learning the skills of a ranger - even though she had never even owned a pet! - and she won the show!

The couple have created a book & dvd called You can sing which is an essential guide for aspiring pop stars, it was recently re-released as Total Singing Tutor. Carrie has also penned a book In search of a father which is due to be released next year.

 

 
 

David

Date of Birth: 8th August 1956

In the early 80's David formed soul funk duo Linx with bassist Sketch and the band had several hit singles including Intuition, Throw away the key, So this is Romance and You're Lying. They released 3 albums, Intuition (1981) Go Ahead (1982) and The Last Linx (1983). Thier most successful album was Intuition which reached number 7 in early 1981.

The band split in 1983 and David decided to go solo, gaining another three top 30 hits and a top 5 duet Could it be i'm falling in love with Jaki Graham. David also found time to write hit songs for other artists including One step closer to you for Gavin Christopher, Hot Chocolate's heartache no 9 and US hit If you were mine for Cheryl Lynn.

During this time, David was working in TV and radio presenting for a number of shows including Riverside, CDQ and was a regular on Mike Read's Pop Quiz.

After his solo career, David moved into session singing, working with artists such as Diana Ross and The Lighthouse Family. In 1998 David and Carrie released a gospel album Watching and waiting which went on to win a prestigious MOBO Award in the catergory of Best Gospel Album.

It was while working on this album that David and Carrie met Take That and thier careers as vocal coaches began, working with artists such as Charlotte Church, Joss Stone, The Spice Girls, S club 7 and Will Young. The couple went on to work on the first series of Pop Idol and David worked on the following Pop Idol tour. After Carrie was involved in Fame Academy 1, David joined her for the first Comic relief does Fame Academy in 2003 and has worked on all the subsequent Fame Academy shows.

David has also enjoyed an acting career, performing at the National Theatre and the Bristol Old Vic as well as for Channel 4 films.

David and Carrie have presented The Heaven and Earth Show together and David has appeared on a number of shows such as Celebrity Master Chef, The Weakest link, Never Mind the Buzzcocks and is a regular panalist on channel 5 show The Wright Stuff.