Based upon many of the inquiries that I have received about American
Idol, I have posted this page to give a clear picture of my Audition and my personal experiance with the American
Idol process.
1. Yes I did go to Memphis and get a Golden Ticket to advance.
2. No, I did not get to audition in front of Paula, Simon and Randy. They are the 3rd round of auditions.
The 1st round is in front of many judges in a large auditorium (in this case the Fedex Forum). This was done
to weed out the talent from the 10,000+ that showed up to audition. The second round is in front of the Executuive Producers
and weeds it down again.
3. Yes all of the "obviously bad" singers that you see on the A.I. Show
are purposely passed through for entertainment purposes only. We had apx. 10 of these people in our group as well.
4. The following is a more detailed description of what took place in Memphis:
We went to Memphis in early September and auditioned for
A.I.. Of the more than 10000 people that auditioned, I was one of around 240 to receive a “golden ticket”
to advance. The first audition was in front of 24 different judges in the Fed Ex Forum (not Randy, Simon and Paula as
we had originally thought). The 2nd audition was in front of the Executive Producers of the show (two guys from Australia). Prior to going in front of the two
Executive Producers, I was approached by one of the judges that had judged me at the first auditions and she pulled me aside.
I was surprised that she actually remembered my name out of the thousands that she judges. Furthermore, I was surprised
because the judges were not even supposed to be interacting with the contestants. She told me “if you do the same
thing you did during the first audition, but ramp it up a bit, you’re in”!
After a 10 hour wait for my chance to audition I entered the room and told them that I was going to sing a song by Keith Urban.
They said “can’t sing that one mate, were not approved”. This was being taped and apparently, they
did not have approval from Keith Urban to use his songs on the air. Even the previous auditioning judge did not know
this when she suggested I “do the same thing”. Not really knowing what these auditions were going to be
like except that we had 30 seconds to “show our talent”, and being so new to singing, I had only prepared the
song by Keith Urban and about half of a song by Harry Chapin (Taxi). Frankly, I could not believe what I was hearing and it was like I went into a fog, for the first time in my life. A.I. told us that most current
singing stars could not even pass their auditions because there standards are so high (for the serious singers, not the ones
who are advanced for entertainment only), the competition is so strong and the pressure is huge.
I only made it to the
2nd audition. During that time, I met many other contestants and their parents.
We met a guy from Nashville who owns a recording studio called Vibe 56. He put the word out about
me, and we subsequently had a few recording studios interested in working with me. We went to Nashville in late November and recorded a song, got a feel for the business
and made a lot of contacts. I am now in the process of taking all of the steps that were suggested by
the different recording studios (develop web site, purchased a nice guitar which I play everyday, currently assembling
a band, writing songs, just finished a music video for CMT, etc…).
If the CMT video or the songs that I’m writing do
not hit before August, I will be auditioning again for next years American Idol. Actually,
I see it as a blessing that I did not “go on” in the auditioning process. If I had gone a few more auditions
further, I would have no longer been eligible to try out in the future. Frankly, I was not prepared and I did not know
what to expect.
I spoke with a parent whose daughter did go on to Hollywood and she made it down to about
the last 40 girls. She said it was grueling and very intense. She was actually relieved when she was sent home.
Interestingly, her dad (who owns Vibe 56) said that if I had made it that far, I would have had a good chance of going
all the way. He had the opportunity to see all of the other guys perform and said that I was better than any of them.
Humbling to hear this, but very encouraging.
You may still see me on some of the advertisements though. After I received the “golden
ticket” they made me sign a lot of forms then they pulled me and one other guy out and
did a TV spot of each of us. Identical to what you see each year on their advertisements (eg: “Hi, my name is
Ryan Gallagher from Ada, Michigan and I’m 17 years old and I’m the next American
Idol”)
So the Journey begins...
God Bless,
Ryan Gallagher
