Athena Renee Singer Guitarist from Los Angeles, CA

While fleeting dreams of musical stardom might have consumed her since she was thirteen years old, Athena Renee is nothing close to your typical pop culture songstress. In truth, if fate hadn't intervened, she might have reached the finish line on the fast track to corporate success by now. Accomplished, business minded and professional as artists come, she is as much a business woman running her own Wisdom Reborn Entertainment and Publishing Company, as she is a stage commanding performer – capable of booking a show and turning it out just the same. Since she can remember, Athena Renee's voice has been a vehicle she could rely on for joy, passion and random thoughts of fame. But there was that thing called life that insisted on obstructing her path. In 2005, the Southeast Georgia (Douglass) native moved to Atlanta, not to pursue her dreams of grandeur as a breakout artist, but because her in-laws (both her mother and father-in-law) suffered simultaneous heart attacks. With her personal matters in her immediate sight and years removed from her first professional gig as lead to the Georgia Mass Choir, her life was all figured out. She'd continue to climb the corporate ladder, pursue her CPA and blow away the occasional room of bystander's with her unique, powerful voice. Suppressing a deep seated desire to perform however, was not as easy as she thought it would be. In fact, it was something that kept her up at night – literally. “All I could think about was music,” Athena discloses. “It was music everywhere. In my dreams… I would wake up at 3 o'clock every morning. My husband thought I was crazy, but every night I would wake up with music [on my mind]. In my dreams even the flowers were singing.” After one of those long nights, Athena was called to use her gift at her godmother's bedside. “She was diagnosed with stage four cancer and hadn't moved in two weeks,” Athena remembers. “She was full of pain. She had morphine in her system, the whole thing… But when I sung 'The Lord's Prayer,' she lifted her hands to the sky – and that was her last time moving before she passed away.” To the dismay of doctors and nurses, who said she would never move again, the family rejoiced at the miracle they'd witnessed. Shaken and equally stirred by the moment, Athena Renee vowed this would not be the last time her voice made a difference in someone's life. “I made a promise to God that if I can move somebody on their deathbed, I was meant to move people that are alive and well,” she tells. “I didn't have any plan. I just knew that I had to do something and once I started doing that, people started coming to me.” As she set out to dominate the local underground with soulful renditions of top 40 hits and original flair, Athena's act caught the attention of Tree Sound Studios General Manager Malissa “Mali” Hunter, who arranged an audition with Grammy nominated hip hop artist B.o.B. Of the forty girls that were there to audition for background singing duties, Athena was among the most impressive, earning praise from the man of the hour. “He told me, 'Honestly, you don't need to be a background singer for anybody,'” Athena recalls. “'You need to have your own mic.'” With that endorsement, the determined singer took her act on the road, courtesy of a private audition Hunter set up with producers of NBC's hit television series “The Voice.” Upon wowing another group, she was off to Hollywood where she spent two months waiting on the opportunity that would change her life. Unfortunately, it never came. “I learned a lot about the system and the machine that is needed for an artist when I went out there,” she says, citing a similar experience with the X-Factor in Atlanta, then Dallas, Texas. “I also learned about the politics behind the scene as well.” Subsequent to her plunge into the unpredictable world of entertainment television, Athena Renee continued to push her brand, landing writing opportunities with Keith Sweat & CoCo (“My Valentine” - 2011) and CyHi Da Prince's Black Hystori Project (2014).