A heavenly voice launched a search for the story behind it after the Los Angeles Police Department posted a video of a mystery singer at an LA Metro station with the caption, "4 million people call LA home. 4 million stories. 4 million voices...sometimes you just have to stop and listen to one, to hear something beautiful."
The mystery woman turned out to be Emily Zamourka, a woman who grew up in Russia and dreamed of being a singer. Zamourka possesses a beautiful voice, but a run of rotten fortune has left her homeless and singing in the subway.
"You know why I do it in the subway?" Zamourka asked. "Because it sounds so great."
In recent times, Zamourka played a violin to entertain, but she says her violin worth $10,000 was stolen.
"It was my income," she said. "It was my everything to me."
So, she turned to the instrument that could not be taken: her voice.
"I'm sleeping where I can sleep," Zamourka said, explaining that she found herself homeless after recently falling ill.
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So, on Thursday, Zamourka was singing at a Metro Purple Line station in Koreatown when an LAPD officer recorded a video that has now been shared tens of thousands of times.
But as curious people searched for Zamourka to hear her story, she had no idea that she was on television and going viral on the internet--until her friends called her.
Now, with a city wanting to hear more of her voice, the woman was left almost speechless.
"Thank you for that," she told the assembled media. "I don't know what to say. I've been praying really hard."
She says she did not go to music school and has no formal training but would not turn down the opportunity to sing on stage.