Pageant News Bureau - Erika Ebbel

When Erika Ebbel plays the piano, her slim fingers dance on the keyboard like a troop of angels. And it sounds heavenly. Specializing in Chopin, but also partial to Beethoven, this svelte blonde is starting to be known outside the United States. She's working to qualify for a major international music competition in Canada.

She performs in pageants, too. And not only does she get to play, she says, "I get to talk! And I get to dress up in a really pretty gown!"

She's teasing us, of course, but there is some truth in this girlish-sounding jest. Ms. Ebbel got into Miss America preliminaries about three years ago, and she says pageants have helped unlock her sense of fun. "Normally, I'm a very serious person. I'm nerdy."

She's too lovely to be a nerd, but she is certainly focused. She started serious training in classical music at age 5. (She admits to having been a slacker at age 3. "All I wanted to do was show the piano teacher my toys.")

Ms. Ebbel has also been a science whiz since childhood. She spent more time at science fairs than at playgrounds, and she loved it. Now she's a chemistry major at MIT, with medical school eventually in her future. She mentors children on the importance of math and science. And when she wants to get away from the pressure, she goes scuba diving.

Erika Ebbel represents Massachusetts at National Sweetheart

True to her overachieving ways, Ms. Ebbel has been a second runner-up and then a first runner-up at Miss Massachusetts. In September 2003, she was second runner-up at National Sweetheart, a competition that pits Miss America system runners-up against one another. Now she wants to go all the way. Her goal is to win Miss Massachusetts 2004, and then Miss America.

If it hadn't been for science, Ms. Ebbel would never have come to the Bay State. She's a Pacific Rim girl. Her roots are in Russia, Japan and Chile, and she grew up in California. MIT drew her eastward, and now Massachusetts is home.

Ms. Ebbel was too nice to tell us about it, but we have heard that a reporter once asked her why she wasting her time on pageants. That's what is known in journalism school as a dumb question. Erika Ebbel never wastes her time on anything.

Photos by Joe Whiteko / PNB except blue swimsuit photo and scuba diving photo, which are courtesy of Erika Ebbel.

Everything in harmony