This morning I woke up at 3 am to go audition for The Voice in Orlando. I signed up in May and posted about it a few entries back. This audition has been sitting in the back of my mind for about two months now. All this time and I was not prepared, I only chose my two songs the night before, and therefore did not know what to expect from my voice. I had only begun to practice just last night, after all.
The outcome was a lot better than I expected. I looked at the rules online, and apparently NBC takes their auditions for this show very seriously. They said to have two songs prepared, and dress in the best way that represents you as an artist, so no chicken costumes. Big relief for me! This means that the guy next to me in the obnoxious getup is not going to get picked over my actual talent. They also said to sing a capella, as they do with American Idol auditions. You can play an instrument in the callback audition, but not for the preliminary.
There were two auditions times, 7 am and 2 pm. I had the 7 am audition, hence the waking up at 3 am. My friend Caitlin and I carpooled the 2-hour drive together and waited in line at the hotel where the auditions were held forever. I almost didn't get let in because I dropped my driver's license in my car and forgot about it after taking it out of my wallet to show to the attendants at the parking garage guardhouse. Turns out, we got a free parking ticket because we were auditioning, so I didn't even need to show them my license and audition pass. I had to use my student ID because it would have taken us too long to return back to the parking garage to get my license. The guard almost didn't let me into the audition because my student ID didn't have my date of birth on it and he needed proof that I wasn't a minor. After a few minutes of watching me ransack my wallet for verification of my birthdate, he decided I was holding up the line and let me in.
After entering the building we walked down the hallway to a ballroom and waited forever in another line to register. At this point, Caitlin and I had gotten separated. I had a really dumb guy register me. He made me wait at the table forever after putting my wristband on and tried to make small talk with me about what I was studying. I stood there for ten minutes until I finally got to leave and go stand in line where they were putting us in our audition groups. I have to say that one of the most annoying parts of the audition was everyone singing in the line. Most of them were girls. Almost all of them sang "Rolling in the Deep" by Adele. I wanted to punch them.
The lines we were put in were the people we were going to be with for the duration of the audition. We were then put in a big room and sat with our line, and then we were moved to a smaller room where we sat with our line. I got on well with the two girls on either side of me and a girl in the row in front of me. I didn't think I would be speaking to a lot of people, but I actually liked the people I was sitting with; we were all really supportive of one another. We waited two hours until they finally called our row to audition.
The ten people in my row were sent into another ballroom where there was one producer from the show. She was really welcoming and the environment was very positive. We were called up individually to sing a verse and the chorus from our song. I took my turn, and nailed it. I sang "I Need You" by Leann Rimes. I mean it when I say I nailed it. No cracks or pitchiness and every note was on pitch. Eventually the rest of the group got to sing their pieces. Nobody was asked to sing their second choice. Nobody was called back from our group either.
Overall, this experience was much better than the one I had at American Idol auditions. We were out much sooner, and clearly NBC takes their auditions more seriously than Fox. They were looking for serious artists, not stupid, talentless idiots who only want their 5 seconds of camera time. If you are a serious artist looking to get somewhere or to really hone your audition skills, I would definitely recommend this over that. I'm very pleased with my audition.
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