‘American Idol’ Hopeful’s Stapleton Cover Earns a Standing O
Before American Idol returns with its next round of auditions on Sunday night (March 26), the show shared an early preview of a performance that was so impressive, Luke Bryan couldn’t help but rise to his feet.
21-year-old restaurant singer Kaeyra sat at a piano for her audition performance, and immediately drew judges in with a husky and emotive performance of Chris Stapleton‘s “Cold.” She started out the heartbreak ballad slow and low, then showcased the upper ranges of her vocal register in the chorus, substituting Stapleton’s raspy vocal runs for her own more delicate, but just as soulful, style.
As the three judges applauded her performance, Bryan rose to a standing ovation, offering a polite bow. “I wasn’t expecting that. You don’t sound like anybody else,” the country star said. “You can tell you’ve sat at the piano. You can tell that music’s just been in your world. It was great. It was really great.”
The other two judges were impressed, too, though Katy Perry had some questions about Kaeyra’s versatility, since her audition was very much in the vein of the restaurant singing that the young performer does for work.
“If you get to go to Hollywood, I wanna hear something less slow,” Perry told the contestant. “Because you have this vibrato that’s really cool. All the world is not a steakhouse.”
“All we’re talking about is range,” Lionel Richie clarified. “If we can get some of that moody voice you have and put it across a fast song, mid-tempo song, slow song, you’ve got all the range you need to make an artist out of this.”
Kaeyra will get the chance to prove her range: The three judges unanimously voted that she move on to Hollywood week, and she walked out of her audition with a Golden Ticket to the next round of judging.
American Idol airs on Sunday nights on ABC.
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PICTURES: See Inside Carrie Underwood’s Beautiful Post-‘American Idol’ Home
Carrie Underwood invested her money wisely after winning American Idol in 2005. One of her first big purchases was a 3,099-square-foot home in the well-to-do Nashville suburb of Franklin, Tenn. Underwood paid $384,000 for a luxurious 3-bedroom, 3.5-bathroom stone and stucco home in a private gated community.
The house features a library, a vaulted ceiling and lovely amenities throughout, but while it’s very nice, it’s certainly not the kind of home you’d picture for a budding country superstar. Underwood wound up being a huge success right out of the gate with her debut album, Some Hearts, and she sold the home in Franklin for $372,500 in 2007, when she purchased the Brentwood mansion that she would later share with her husband, Mike Fisher.
