From the beginning, Carla had no choice but to become a musician; there is a lot of music on both sides of her family. Carla learned the basics of singing from her mother, Natalia, and her musicianship from her father, Terry. It is reported that when she was born, she didn’t cry like most babies, but belted out “That’s Alright Mama”.

By the time she was 4, Carla could be found playing in the room off the kitchen. No, it wasn’t with dolls or tea sets, but it was with a vacuum cleaner that she would use to suck up her hair so it stood straight up so that she looked like a rock star. Then she could be heard singing “Boy Named Sue”

Her parents finally realized they had an unusual child on their hands, so they went out and bought her a starter acoustic guitar. Of course, she promptly ‘forgot’ to practice once the famed ‘F’ chord came along, but she kept right on singing to Elvis, Johnny Cash, and Canada’s own Carole Baker. It wasn’t until she was 14 that she really started to practice the guitar again.

The next few years brought many exciting adventures to Carla. She moved to Vancouver and went to the Trebas Institute of Recording Arts and earned a diploma in Artist Management. She sang with show bands and played bass in country bands that toured across Canada and the U.S. She soon realized that the only way to get ahead in the business was to become serious about songwriting and performing her own music.

August of 1996 saw the release of “This is Carla Rugg”. It is a contemporary country album that achieved great critical success. It released 5 singles and 3 videos. The single “Who Says A Woman Can’t Be Strong” even garnered Carla success in parts of Europe, resulting in 2 tours in Denmark. (Read and see more about this CD on the discography page)

The new CD, “Dynamite” came out of an 11 year friendship with Pete Turland. Pete and Carla had worked in a show band together in 1991. They stayed good friends through the trial and tribulations of the next few years with Pete seeing that Carla had the potential to be a great Rockabilly singer. In April of 2000, Carla finally realized that Pete was right. She already knew a lot of the material and was familiar with many of the Rockabilly masters. It took a year to get the financing together to record the CD, and another year or so to finally release it.

Pete played a copy of the CD to Dave at East Side Records and Dave agreed to release “Dynamite” on his label. Everyone has worked very hard to make this the best possible CD. If you have any questions or comments, please make an entry into the guestbook. Carla will answer each and every one of you!