Heather Mehudar

Heather (an only child) was born in Waukegan, Illinois, USA to a single mother (Laura) 6 weeks before her 19th birthday. Shortly after, her mother moved back to Kenosha, Wisconsin, USA where she began raising Heather. Heather was born with a "trigger thumb" on her right hand and had to have surgery to correct it when she was one year old. Because of this surgery, Heather is left-handed when righting or eating, however, she is right-hand dominant when playing instruments or sports. At the age of 3, Heather discovered she could sing the music on the albums that were playing. Jethro Tull's "Aqualung" was the first album she learned all the lyrics to. It was at this time she decided she wanted to grow up to sing, dance and act. On her 5th birthday, Heather and her mother relocated to Green Bay, Wisconsin to be near Heather's maternal grandparents. Heather attended Helen Keller Elementary School until the 6th grade when they relocated to a country/suburb area of Suamico and Howard where she attended Bay View Middle School. Since Heather was a transfer from a school which had a well-known program for developmentally challenged children and the fact that she was extremely shy around strangers, Bay View Middle School officials assumed Heather was mentally slow and placed her in classes with their developmentally challenged students. When Heather turned in a 10-page research paper for her science class (a subject favorite) and her English teacher saw that she was already writing in cursive (something the slower classmates had not learned yet), the school officials had realized their mistake. However, because the school year was almost over they waited until the 7th grade to make the corrections. Mid-way through the 7th grade and again in the 8th grade, Heather was advanced in her English classes. But all was not wasted, since this is where Heather was introduced to music theory which proved to be instrumental for her future. In the 7th grade, Heather's Choir Director noticed her strong singing abilities and approached her to perform a solo for the schools spring concert, but because Heather was so shy and lacked confidence, she declined. Then, at the beginning of the 8th grade, auditions were held for the Swing Choir of which Heather became a member. The song the girls auditioned with was "Home" from the musical "The Wiz". The Choir Director was surprised to hear the normally shy and submissive Heather protest when her audition was cut off just before the climactic high notes of the song. When he obliged her, he was pleasantly surprised - yet again - to hear her angelic soprano voice ring out the notes with pitch precision. That spring, Heather was approached to enter the district's vocal Solo/Ensemble competition with a Class B song, which was considered an honor since first-timers were usually entered in the Class C category (such as was the case for her Trio entry). Her solo and trio were both awarded 1st (gold) medals. This success, coupled with her new knowledge of music theory inspired Heather to write her first three songs on homemade manuscript paper . . . without the use of a keyboard. Then she would bring the songs in to her Choir Director to play them for her so she could hear what they sounded like. This skill impressed her Choir Director so much that he spoke to her mother at the Parent-Teacher Conference and expressed Heather's great talent for writing music. The next Christmas, Heather was given a 64-key Casio keyboard from her mother to help her with songwriting. This was a gift Heather kept until she was in her mid-20s. Then 9th grade arrived and it was time for Bay Port High School. It was in her English class with Julie Robinson that her gift to read with emotion was discovered. Mrs. Robinson approached Heather to enter the district Forensics competition as a Solo-Actor. She was given a choice of two monologues, of which she chose the Glass Menagerie. Heather was clueless as to exactly what it was that she was being asked to do and did not rehearse adequately so she had to withdraw from the program. The next year, in 10th grade, she tried again but was still very shy about speaking in front of people. The end result was Heather having an anxiety attack and withdrawing the day of the competition. Her Junior and Senior years, Heather had much more confidence and success in completing her monologues at the Forensics competitions. Meanwhile, Heather was cleaning up on the vocal Solo/Ensemble awards each year earning 1sts on every solo, duet, trio, quartet, madrigal and vocal jazz ensemble. Her Sophmore year, Heather advanced to Class A material which qualifies you for the State competition if you are awarded a *1st. Heather's only year of achieving a solo *1st was her Junior year performance of "The Black Swan" from the opera "The Medium". Ironically, she was struck with a severe case of bronchitis for the district competition and couldn't hear a note she sang, yet she still was able to sing her way to the State level and earned another 1st (gold) medal for that performance. During the summer break before her Junior year, Heather attended Vocal Jazz camp and Choir camp at UW-Green Bay. She saw a notice regarding auditions for college scholarships to attend the university in the fall of 1989. She auditioned for each award and won both scholarships. Because of these awards to major in Music Performance, she took up playing the flute and joined the band and Marching Band for her Senior year. She was also entered the District Solo/Ensemble competition for flute and won awards for her Solo, Trio and Woodwind Ensemble and went on the band trip for an international contest in Toronto, Canada. During her high school years, Heather was also a crew member for high school productions of "Grease" and "A Funny Thing Happened on My Way to the Forum". She was a singer for "The Wiz" and cast as "Bessie" to act, sing and dance in "South Pacific" as was Dave Quimby, who pursued a professional acting career. When the lead for "Nellie" broke her leg during a softball game and the part went to a sophomore, Heather and the other Senior classmates were upset with the director's decision initially. However, Heather would've only had a month to learn the script and was happy to stay with the role of "Bessie". Heather's Senior year was also her attempts at the One-Act Play competition for which she was cast as the "Princess" for "The Happy Scarecrow". It was also during this time that Heather discovered her propensity for creative writing skills. She already knew she had a knack for writing songs. However, in her Junior year literature class, the class was given the assignment of writing a parody of whatever real item they wanted and to include their handwritten rough draft with their typed final draft. Since Heather's rough draft had only one minor spelling error, her teacher assumed she had plagiarized a professionally written parody. When he realized this was Heather's original work, he suggested she submit the parody to a number of magazines for publishing. She never did, but a few months later Weird Al Yankovic came out with a parody almost identical to that which SHE had written. The parody was of Michael Jackson's "Bad" and was called "Fat". She took her teacher's compliment to heart and signed up for the Creative Writing class her Senior year. Green Bay Community Theater: to quench her thirst for more acting experience, Heather was in the local production of "Equus" her Junior year in the roll or "Jill". Her Senior year, she was also cast as "Sophie Lawton / Triggs" in "Murder in Play". Her Freshman year at UWGB (1989-1990), she was a background singer and dancer as well as part of the crew for "Jesus Christ Superstar". Her Sophmore year she was the Assistant Stage Manager for "Wanted: Dead, Alive . . . or Maimed". Meanwhile, she auditioned for a number of plays at the Green Bay Community Theater but because she could 'cry on cue', became frustrated for being type-cast for roles that required this ability. Exasperated, Heather left the world of acting and, shortly after, changed from a double major in Music and Theater Performance to a double major in Psychology and Human Development with a minor in Applied Music. Even though Heather stopped pursuing her childhood dreams of acting and dancing, she still had the joy of music in her home (and heart) by playing flute, singing and writing new songs when the occasional music muse moved her. In the meantime, she continued on her quest for knowledge and earned an M.S. and Ph.D. in Counseling. In Fall of 2002, Heather relocated to Las Vegas, Nevada, USA where she attended school for a certificate in Massage Therapy and changed careers yet again. Now she has her own massage business for spiritual healing, which caters to A-list celebrities and other high-profile clients. She is also employed as a Massage Therapist on The Strip and spends her days off writing screenplays for films to help expand the collective consciousness of the world. Her latest works include a musical that is a comical love story called "Déjà Duet", which is based closely on events expected to happen in her love life. All songs included were composed by Heather as well. The other screenplay "Massage U." is a comical autobiography that addresses her path of spiritual enlightenment while on her path to becoming a Massage Therapist. Both were started and finished in 2008 with the hopes of having them in theaters around the nation by late 2009 to early 2010.