St. Paul jazz vocalist Katia Cardenas finds her voice, again

Jul. 25—In 2014, Katia Cardenas fulfilled a childhood dream and launched her career as a jazz singer. After months playing anywhere that would have her, that October, she landed her first big gig at the Dakota in downtown Minneapolis.

"That was my ultimate goal, to play the Dakota. And there I was, less than a year into this," Cardenas said. "It was very exciting."

But after four successful years behind the microphone that followed, Cardenas stopped singing completely. It hurt to sing. It hurt to talk. Fearing that pain was injuring her voice, she thought she might never sing again.

Now, the St. Paul-based vocalist is getting ready to roar back into action, with her first major concert in three years booked for July 30 at the recently restored Granada Theater in Minneapolis.

"There's nothing holding me back," she said. "I know what I need to do to take care of myself, repair and recuperate. I also know how much joy singing brings to me and that I want to keep it as a mainstay in my life."

Growing up in a musical family

Cardenas spent her early life in Everett, Wash., before her family moved to Sacramento when she was in middle school. Music was in her blood. Her mother, Janis Kelly, sang professionally with Maurice White and the Emotions and opened for Rufus and Chaka Khan, Tower of Power and Carole King. Her father, Mark Cardenas, is a keyboardist whose resume includes a brief, but vital, stint in the Time when the R&B band appeared in "Purple Rain" alongside Prince. (He still collects royalties from the gig, she said.)

After spending her early days in a Waldorf school, Cardenas went on to graduate from a performing arts high school where she sang in jazz and show choirs and developed a passion for musical theater. She applied to a handful of colleges and ended up choosing Macalester College, in part because her older sister was studying there. Macalester was also the only school on her list that was in a large city.

"Something about the Midwest felt like a new start, with new possibilities," she said. And Cardenas took full advantage of those possibilities, joining several a cappella groups and other student combos while also diving deep into campus theater. She graduated with a psychology major and theater minor with the goal to pursue a career as an actor and theater arts educator.

The thriving Twin Cities arts community prompted Cardenas to stay in town where she has since worked with numerous arts and theater groups. Currently, she's the education coordinator for Pangea World Theater in Minneapolis and the executive director of Minnesota Jazz Education in St. Paul.

"By the time I graduated, I had done a couple of gigs, but I felt disconnected from the music scene," she said. "I didn't really know where to start. I focused on teaching theater, acting, serving tables ... music really took a back seat."

The music bug bit again, though, in 2013, when Cardenas starred in a production of "Girl Group" at Minneapolis' Theatre Unbound. "It was about a band and they had musicians coach us actors on how to play," she said. "That helped break that barrier for me."

She got in touch with Mac Santiago, executive director of the then-new Jazz Central Studios. "I asked him who I should listen to and who are the players in town," Cardenas said. "He invited me to be a host at the club on Thursday nights, when they focused on vocalists. I got to see all these singers come through and learn about the scene. I took in a lot of inspiration during that time."

By 2014, she was ready to give singing a proper shot.

A breakthrough at the Dakota

Cardenas began playing out with small combos at any venue that would have them. She made enough of a stir that the Dakota offered her a full-band show.

"It was very exciting, but it also felt like I kind of skipped a step," she said. "But they loved me and brought me back a month and a half later and I went to perform every other month for the next year or so. I was even asked to perform for the grand opening of (the Dakota's now-closed St. Paul club) Vieux Carre in July 2015."

Cardenas booked gigs everywhere from Icehouse in Minneapolis to the Twin Cities Jazz Festival, with her own band as well as Casablanca Orchestra, Sonically Speaking and Phantom Heart. Local website Jazz Police called her "the fastest rising star on the Twin Cities jazz scene."

"By 2018, I had upward of 10 gigs a month. I was singing all the time," she said.

That fall, Cardenas took a break from performing to focus on preparing for tour dates in Mexico.

"When I got back from Mexico, I started experiencing some issues with my voice," she said. "The quality of my voice was really lacking and I was spooked. I went to a doctor and found I had vocal nodules on my vocal cords."

Vocal nodules — hard noncancerous growths that develop on vocal cords — are a common injury for vocalists. Cardenas had them removed, canceled all of her gigs and went on vocal rest.

"After a couple months, the doctor did another scope and the nodules were gone. But I still felt like there was something wrong. It hurt after 10 minutes of talking. I stopped singing completely," she said.

After seeing specialists at the University of Minnesota's Lions Voice Clinic, Cardenas was diagnosed with muscle tension dysphonia, a condition that causes tight muscles around the larynx. She went through extensive speech therapy and things improved, somewhat. The progress plateaued in May 2019.

"What's changed is my mentality," she said. "I thought if I was having pain, I had to stop. But a speech therapist helped me to understand that with this condition, pain doesn't equal damage. It's just something I have to live with. It was quite intense emotionally. I felt like I had to decide if I was going to sing or not."

Emerging from the pandemic

Cardenas decided, yes, she was going to try singing again. Part of her therapy was to get out and test her limits. She began going to open jams, cabarets and singing a jazz standard or two. She got to understand what she could and couldn't sing and eventually realized it was actually talking that caused her the most pain.

When Cardenas was confident enough to start booking concerts again, the pandemic hit, forcing her to pivot. She practiced regularly to keep up her voice. She entered a songwriting challenge and wrote 30 songs in 30 days.

"I had an accountability buddy who wrote 30 poems and we'd share our work with each other," she said. "It was a really big deal for me. I had written a couple original songs before, but I never marketed myself as a singer/songwriter. Writing has always terrified me, but I realized I had to get out of my own way."

As for those new songs, Cardenas is still pondering what she'll ultimately do with them. But for now, her focus is returning to the stage. She tested the waters with backyard concerts. In May, she performed in a 70-minute set in an empty Dakota that was part of a series of virtual concerts sponsored by the Twin Cities Jazz Festival.

Cardenas considers her upcoming Granada Theater concert her comeback and first of many live shows to come. But she's taking a new approach to her craft.

"The biggest difference is a change in my value system. Growing up with 'American Idol,' I thought to be respected and considered a good singer that I had to belt, I had to really wail. I prided myself in that and I did it — a lot. But it hurt to sing that hard. And when you start at 100, you've got nowhere to go. I feel like this experience has really solidified a deep belief in the value of dynamics.

"It's been a long road, but I'm going to be the best I've ever been. Singing brings me so much joy that I can't not do it."

KATIA CARDENAS CONCERT

— What: An Evening with Katia Cardenas

— When: 8 p.m. July 30

— Where: Granada Theater, 3022 Hennepin Ave. S., Mpls.

— Tickets: $20-$15 via eventbrite.com