Biography

In a musical world where ''format'' and ''market'' are paramount concerns, the music of Anastacia is to use a favorite phrase of Duke Ellington's ''beyond category.''

Her remarkable Epic/Daylight debut album, Not That Kind ( due out February, 2000 ), can't be classified simply as any one thing: dance music, pop music, rock, r&b. Featuring the premier single ''I'm Outta Love,'' the album is a blend of all these sounds and morea compelling collection of original songs drawing on the full spectrum of this gifted artist's musical influences and life experience.

Any successful musical career is a combination of hard work and happy accident. This one is no exception.

Anastacia Newkirk ( her real name ) was born in Chicago on the 17th of September 1973 and was raised by her mother in New York City following her parent's divorce. At age 14, she moved back to the West Side of Manhattan. ''I come from a very artistic family,'' says the artist. ''My father was a singer on the Catskills hotel and East Coast nightclub circuits. My mother is an actress who worked in musical theater and on Broadway. It wasn't as though I've wanted to be a singer all my life, but I grew up in an atmosphere of artistic expression and encouragement.''

Anastacia graduated from the Professional Children's School in Manhattan where, she recalls,
''I was just about the only student not working already. '' She sang along with her mother's Barbra Streisand and Elton John records; and with her older sister, became a regular at the New York dance club 1018.

It was her first introduction to house music and ''freestyle.'' At the time I didn't even know what it was,''Anastacia admits, ''but emotionally I felt very attached to this very rhythmic music. The way I sing today is the way I dance: very freestyle, just going wherever the music is taking me.'' She became a familiar figure on ''Club MTV'' and danced in several hit videos, including Salt-N-Pepa's ''Everybody Get Up'' and ''Twist And Shout.'' One night, ''this producer approached me in the club and asked me if I was a singer. And from that point on, there were different producers involved in what I would call 'trying to find my break.''

Always, she worked to develop herself as an artist, not just as a demo singer or backing vocalist. But Anastacia's singular talent--that of a White woman singing in an essentially Black idiom, in a voice that had no color--defied easy classification and baffled even those well-meaning professionals who recognized her natural ability.

''It felt like every time I tried to do what I want to do--which is what you hear on my album today-- nobody wanted me to do it. They either wanted me to tone down and go more 'adult contemporary' because of the way I look, or they wanted to put me in the hip-hop zone and make me the
Y2K Teena Marie. No one seemed to believe I could work as me.''

O.G. Pearce, a Los Angeles writer/producer/keyboardist whose credits include Montell Jordan and CeCe Penniston, was the first successfully capture Anastacia's vision on tape with the song
''One More Chance.''

''I wrote that song when I was still in New York, probably seven years ago,''recalls Anastacia, who moved to Los Angeles circa 1993. ''I had the whole orchestration in my head. I sang it to O.G. and he did a really good interpretation...He allowed me to design what I was hearing in my head and create my first real song.'' However, a deal with Pearce's production company failed to result in a recording contract.

But in 1998, at urging of new manager Lisa Braudé, Anastacia entered MTV's version of ''Star Search'' called ''The Cut.'' This competition saw 160 contestants whittled down to just ten finalists before an electic panel of judges including Pete Rock, David Foster, and Faith Evans. With her high-energy original song ''Not That Kind,'' Anastacia emerged as one of those finalists (though not the winner ). But it was the break for which she had worked so long and hard.

''The reaction was incredible,'' she recalls. ''I mean, Michael Jackson called me at home! And over the next few months I met the president of every major record label.'' In March 1999, Anastacia signed an exclusive recording contract with Daylight Records, an Epic custom label founded by Epic Records Executive Vice President David Massey.

Not That Kind finds the singer collaborating with some of the industy's most skilled pop craftsmen. The most prominent is Grammy Award winner Ric Wake, whose resumé includes major hits by Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, and Taylor Dane. Rick produced the moving ballad ''Nothin' At All'' and also brought his expert touch to ''Not That Kind''--an Anastacia song with an arrangement that echoes prime Stevie Wonder--and to ''Wishing Well,'' a mid-tempo track with an unforgettable chorus. Ric and The Shadowmen co-produced the rock-flavored ''Cowboys & Kisses,'' which was co-written by Anastacia.

Sam Watters of Color Me Badd and Louis Biancaniello produced four standout tracks including ''Made For Lovin' You,'' ''Don't You Wanna,'' ''I Ask Of You'' ( one of the year's most moving ballads ), and the eminently danceable ''I'm Outta Love.'' Sam and Louis co-wrote all four songs with Anastacia.

Carl Sturken and Evan Rogers are the hitmaking composers of N'Sync's ''( God Must Have Spent )  A Little More Time On You. '' Sturken and Rogers produced two tracks: ''Same Old Story,'' co-written with Anastacia; and ''Who's Gonna Stop The Rain.''

''Most of these songs were written quickly and spontaneously,'' says the singer, ''and that's how I sang them. Because if I'm singing the song too long or too many times, it becomes contrived. I'm no longer singing the way I want to sing, but the way I think the song should be sung.''

Anastacia faces her future with clarity and confidence, believing that ''everything took its due course. You really have to know what you're getting into in this business. You can't just love to sing and think it's gonna be grand. You have to know about the business--and I have learned a tre-mendous amount.

''I don't feel like, gee, it took forever to get to this point. This was exactly when it was supposed to happen.''