Brick teen Nashville bound for singing career
Brittany Nagy to sign contract with recording studio soon
BY DANIELLE MEDINA Correspondent

ERIC SUCAR staff Brick resident Brittany Nagy, 14, and her family plan to relocate to Nashville, Tenn., in the near future. The teenager recently signed a contract with a country music record label. Story, page 5.

BRICK TOWNSHIP - Like a lot of other teenage girls her age, Brittany Nagy enjoys shopping, swimming and hanging out with her friends.

But as Nikki Britt, Nagy is far from your typical teenager.

In September, Nikki Britt, 14, signed a recording and management contract with Rustic Records Inc., a Nashville-based country music label, and is currently at work on her first album.

"Right now, they're sending me a lot of different songs and I'm writing my own," said Nagy, a Brick resident. "We're looking for the best ballad and up-tempo song to be my first two singles."

And next week, Nagy and her parents, John and Theresa, will travel to Nashville for a ceremonial contract signing - a sort of coming-out party that will introduce her to Music City's record industry and press as its newest young country star.

ERIC SUCAR staff Fourteen-year-old Brittany Nagy, who recently signed a record contract with a country music record label, is seen here at her home in Brick on Dec. 27.

"It's really exciting," said Nagy, a freshman at Lakehurst School of Performing Arts. "I'm going to wear a teal dress with gold trim. It's pretty."

Nagy may be a newcomer on the Nashville music scene, but she's a veteran singer and dancer, with dozens of community productions, charity appearances and Broadway auditions under her belt.

The Nagy's knew very early on that their daughter had an ear for music.

"One day I was folding laundry and I heard her sing Toni Braxton's 'Unbreak My Heart' word for word," said Theresa Nagy, a financial assistant.

John Nagy also said that her daughter was never shy about performing.

"Her grandmother would take her to the bank with her and she'd just sing for people," he said.

"Brittany will literally sing on the spot for anyone. She even sings in her sleep," said Theresa Nagy. "And when she sings, because she's so petite, you think there has to be someone singing behind her."

Nagy began tap, ballet and jazz lessons at three and eventually moved onto singing lessons at seven and acting lessons at 10.

"She knew that there was a difference between singing and learning how to sing," said Theresa Nagy.

Nagy has been taking vocal lessons with Sal Dupree, one of the country's foremost voice teachers, for the past four years.

"She has a great voice, but she also has the emotion and inflection to go along with it," Dupree said. "She has an uncanny way of making the realism of a song come out even though she's so young and hasn't had that life experience yet. She knows how to deliver a song."

Nagy began recording demos of country music songs and Disney songs at age 10, that her father, John, would eventually use to send out to record companies in Nashville.

In early 2006, Brittany was asked to appear on The Hollywood Hooligan's Rock CD, which features a mix of young celebrities from music, film and television raising money for a Kidz Helping Kidz, a charitable organization.

In June 2006, Kent Wells, a Nashville producer who has worked with Dolly Parton, Kenny Chesney and Kenny Rogers, invited Brittany to his studio to record three original songs she wrote - "Roller Coaster Ride," "Safe Harbor" and "I've Got a Song to Sing" - with Parton's musicians.

"They really helped me with the melodies," said Nagy, who taught herself how to play the piano before she started taking lessons.

The inspiration for the songs came after a tumultuous year for Brittany at Lake Riviera Middle School, where Theresa Nagy said her daughter was the object of bullying and harassment. It was so bad that the Nagy's considered pulling Brittany out of school several times and home-schooling her.

"Girls just became very vicious," she said. "They were jealous of her talent and the attention she was receiving for singing. But Brittany turned the pain around and put it into her music."

"I read a lot of autobiographies and women who went through a lot," said Brittany, who points to Dolly Parton, Martina McBride and LeAnn Rimes as her musical influences.

She adopted her stage name at 12, to avoid any kind of confusion or reference to pop star Britney Spears.

"My middle name is Nicole, so I just flipped it around to come up with Nikki Britt," said Nagy, who also sings in Spanish.

In August, Rustic Records officials contacted Brittany and her family to let them know they were very interested in meeting her. Two weeks later, the Nagys were in Nashville.

"We went down to Nashville and I had to sing live and in the studio," Brittany recalled. "They wanted to make sure I sounded the same live and on record."

They offered her a contract on the spot.

"I was so surprised," she said.

Brittany is practicing new songs and starting to market her stage persona Nikki Britt. Once the album is completed, she will travel to radio stations across the country to promote it.

A performance at the Grand Ole Opry, Nashville's famed music venue, is also a possibility, said John Nagy, an engineer at a pharmaceutical company.

"She has a lot of work ahead of her," he said.

The whole family will relocate to Nashville within the next year to support Brittany's career.

But for the entire Nagy family, which includes two brothers, Matthew and Michael, and a grandmother who lives with them, it's worth it.

"It really has been a beautiful experience for our entire family," said Theresa Nagy. "It's brought us all even closer together."

And they know that Brittany can handle the work and the pressures of being a music star.

"She's very dedicated to her career," said Theresa Nagy. "How could we say no? This is her dream. We can see it in her eyes."

While Nashville is on the immediate horizon, Nagy has even bigger plans for her future.

"I want to be international," she said.