To call singer, actress and entertainer Toni Morrell an impressionist would be a misnomer for this very talented dynamic vocalist. What she does in her one-woman show, “Remembering the Ladies,” is to capture the essence of what made these legendary femmes of the stage, screen and television so captivating.

Recreating classic performance of Judy Garland, Edith Piaf, Marilyn Monroe, Shirley Bassey, Carol Channing, Marlene Dietrich and Lucille Ball, she has performed throughout the United States, Great Britain and Europe, starring on Italy’s #1 primetime entertainment show and co-starring twice with Broadway Legend Carol Channing. She recently became the worldwide voice-over spokesperson for the Pixar/Disney motion picture, “Tinker Bell.”

Currently based in L.A., Morrell has journeyed far and wide from her birthplace of Scunthorpe, located in the North of En-gland. She came from a family that liked to go to the Saturday afternoon theater showing Hollywood movies. The showbiz bug hit the young impressionable lady at the age of nine when she marched onstage at a local talent show, much to the chagrin of her parents, and sang the Debbie Reynolds song “Tammy.”

“By the age of 11, I was producing shows,” she said in her still very evident and proper British accent, “I rounded up 19 young girls and my long-suffering brother, Stuart, and wrote and produced shows that we would present at all of the women’s clubs and church halls in the vicinity.

“I was taking piano lessons so I was writing the arrangements and I like to do my own take on songs, pretty much a “Give My Regards to Broadway” revue. So I was a pretty bossy little girl and a bloody entrepreneur, or so I thought!” She laughed. “I was also very inspired by the shows I’d watch on the BBC.”

What followed was a stream of national talent shows that she would always win due to her dynamic voice and captivating energy on stage. By the age of 14, she began auditioning for television, securing various roles and parts. “I sang in concert with the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.”

By the time she was 17, Morrell was a seasoned entertainer and would perform in cabarets, lounges and venues large and small. “I would work in these huge venues or in small smoky clubs. I worked for the various miner’s clubs and iron and steelworker’s clubs and they could be a tough audience, let me tell you. You had to really entertain them, if they liked you they’d let you live!”

The next ten years was a series of cabarets and resort showrooms in Europe, throughout Great Britain, on the Canary Islands and the Jersey Channel Islands. “I worked with a Spanish speaking band, but we got along wonderfully. Music is the universal language, you know.”

But even with increasing success in her homeland and Europe, her dream of coming to America finally became a reality when she decided to make a move in 1989, and landed in Miami with no real contacts, just her usual unbounded enthusiasm. “American people are so hospitable and friendly.”

Soon she was performing on cruise ships and made a contact that brought her to the cabarets of New York City. “I wanted to see the U.S. so in 1994, I took a Grey-hound bus to Las Vegas!” Starting out as a cigarette girl at the Dunes she soon rose to be the star attraction of the Union Plaza’s production of “High Pressure.”

Eventually ending up in L.A, she met her husband and musical director David Dial and her producer-director Karen G. Cadle which became an integral part of her show. Cadle has produced and directed one-hour specials with Audrey Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Doris Day, Bette Davis, Lana Turner and Elizabeth Taylor. Dial is an award-winning keyboard “wiz” and has served as musical/technical director for several Broadway musicals and with entertainers Peter Allen, Burt Bach-arach and Carol Channing.

She will be making a one-time rare desert appearance so if you haven’t experienced the rich quality of her voice and her well staged multi-media presentation then you’re in for a special treat.