TV Times

TV Times

Ramona Carr back in Lanka after ten years
Romona Carr, famous Sri Lankan Singer and now based in Turkey, is back in action in Colombo. Romona and Dilup will be performing at Gatsby’s Jazz and Blues Club at the Galadari Hotel for a special appearance on Thursday, December 16 and Friday December 17 for two performances per night.

She sings mostly Jazz standards made popular by Diana Kral, Natalie Cole, Ella Fitzgerald and Norah Jones to name a few. She performs at the Turkish Riviera in Antalya on the Mediterranean Sea, which is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world. This is the first time Ramona is in town after ten years.

Singer Ramona Carr was born in Kandy to Olga Bolling (of the famous Matale planting family) and Albert Mellican who was born in Myanmar (Burma). She studied at Holy Family Convent Colombo. Her mother is a classical pianist and her father has a fine singing voice.

As a child they had many sings a long around the piano and Romona along with her sisters Ingrid and Yasmin were taught to harmonize at an early age. Romona started singing on house wives choice on Radio Ceylon at the age of 7 and went on to win the Island Wide Maliban Talent Contest. At age nine her family migrated to the United States. She grew up in Rocheter New York.

Once settled in the States she joined the choir and took piano and voice lessons. She started singing professionally at age 15 (while still in high school) fronting a very popular Rocheter band Equilibrium and performed with them at age 22 met and married musician Jeffrey Carr. They toured the States with Sonny Turner former lead singer of the Platters. “Sony was the ultimate entertainer and I learned so much watching him”. We toured every where from Las Vegas to Miami to Hawaii. She and Jeffrey Carr finally settled in Atlanta Ga where they eventually parted ways. By then the family had settled in Los Angeles California where she joined them.

In 1980 and 1982 she performed at the Supper Club of the Oberoi Hotel with the Peter Prins Combo. After performing in the States for several years she returned to Sri Lanka once again in 1987 where she had the good fortune of teaming up with the most talented people. She has even worked with and their year at the Ramada Renaissance (now Trans Asia) was a tremendous experience. That engagements led to another wonderful experience which took her and Dilup to the Turkish Riviera Antalya on the Mediterranean Sea, which is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world.

She fell in love with the place and performs there to this day. The Turks have embraced her and refer to her as their “Sri Lankan Princess” She has been entertaining there for the last 12 years.

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