So after 6 weeks we finally got an email from The Voice-kids. Cherine (Olivia's voice teacher had 6 kids get through the final round) only two were invited to the TV audition. Olivia was one of them and they wanted her to sing Roar- by Katy Perry. They said thousands of kids auditioned with the song, but they wanted Olivia to sing it. Olivia is tiny (size of an 8 year old) and the show is for kids from 8-14 years old. So Olivia had a really big song for a really small body. It was hilarious!
Cherine quickly introduced Olivia to Jack (the other student who got through). Jack preformed in Love Never Dies (Phantom of the Opera 2, as the little boy Gustav) he was so good he was invited to play Gustav for the filming of Love Never Dies with Universal studios. Here is a clip of him from 2 years ago- he has only gotten better!!
Jack since has played every lead role on Broadway which he fit the brief for, we were a little intimidated since Olivia hadn't done much. Once we met the family we fell in love with Jack. Jack is the most polite 12 year old boy I have ever met. Most of the boys a little older than Olivia are obnoxious and throw dirt and are sloppy. Jack makes eye contact with adults and is never doing anything obnoxious.
To get Olivia comfortable preforming on stage Cherine set up a few gigs with her and Jack. The first was a fundraiser for a bowling club. Olivia sang 'inescapable' by Jessica Mauboy, and got everyone to clap along. One boy with downsyndrom got up and started dancing and Olivia didn't know what to do. Jack started dancing with him when he sang his song, but Olivia just kind of stood there. It was a really good experience for Olivia to learn how to react to the crowd, and get more comfortable with people getting into her music, and likewise how to respond back.
After a couple months of practise, it was time to fly up to Sydney for the blind auditions. I was nervous juggling family and setting aside time for Olivia to practice, but excited to finally get to see what all her hard work would do.
Luckily (Thanks to Cherine) when Olivia flew up to Sydney to film with Fox Studios, she already knew one other contestant. She was on the same flight as Jack going up to Sydney. We stayed in the same serviced apartments and we hung out with them. Jack was to audition the day before Olivia and after his audition, he called her to walk her through everything (without sharing his results- everything had to be confidential). We were told not to take any pictures while we were there and I am sad I don't really have any.
Unfortunately for us, when my family came to visit my mom brought a head cold over from the USA winter. It went around the family with Olivia just barely recovering (or so we thought) in time for the live TV audition. When the family flew up to Sydney, Thomas was the last one with the cold, and all the other contestants wisely kept their distance from our family.
Olivia was on-set every day. She had pretty early starting times, but also had a few rest days scheduled. Unfortunately, on our first day with a late start, Olivia woke up at 6:00 am and threw up, then two hours later threw up again, and then again an hour before we were supposed to be on set. I didn't want her to get disqualified, but I had to call and ask if we could take a day off. They re-arranged our schedule and gave her a very early start for the following day (which was supposed to be her rest day). This meant she never got a day to sleep in the whole week.
Since it was a program dealing with kids, they have working restrictions which means they have to take a certain amount of breaks. This meant a lot of waiting around. There were games, lots of uno cards, movies playing to keep everyone's nerves down and every day the kids would film something different.
Every day the kids would do hair and make-up. Then each day they would film something different. They would film interviews about the kids, they would film interviews with the parents about the kids. They would film the red-carpet walk with the families, they did bio's on the kids and had parents submit pictures. They also had the kids practice singing on The Voice stage. They had workers in the chairs and had one scenario where the chairs would turn around and one scenario where the chairs would not. In both situations the fake judges would give the kids pointers and ask them questions.
Sitting in the audience seeing your kid preform with all the lights during their first sound check, is really nerve wreaking. It's not even the real show, and the audience is empty but my heart was pounding for her. We were worried about doing this show, once we saw which 90 second of Roar Olivia got to sing, (it was just the beginning with all the big notes cut out) we were worried she was getting set up to fail. We wondered if we should pull out. Not sure how it would go down if all her friends saw her audition on TV and not have any chairs turn around...would Olivia take that as a personal rejection from a celebrity or would she be ok? We tried to change the song around (with a little improv) and the manager said there were copyright issues and she need to sing it straight with no deviations.
The Blind auditions were easily the most nerve wreaking part of this whole TV show. Some kids came totally unglued (one went on stage and sang completely off key- apparently he had never done that EVER! He had to beat out 8,000 kids for that spot and singing off key would have weeded him out months ago). Another girl (both her parents work on TV) started crying and couldn't pull herself together before her audition and totally bombed it. Kids who made it through went upstairs to get debriefed by a psychologist and kids who didn't get through went downstairs to get debriefed by a psychologist. We knew half would get cut (it went from 100 to 45 kids (15 kids on three teams)).
When Olivia went up to sing they pulled our family into a small white room- we didn't get to sit with the audience. We all had microphones and we were told to speak our thoughts. We had 4 big cameras on our face, and then we stood there and watched 4 big TV screens. Olivia was on the top big screen, and then the three judges (Delta, Mel B, and the Madden brothers) each had their own screen so we could watch the judges reactions to her song.
Olivia right before she goes on to sing
I honestly don't remember anything- it was all a massive blur. Olivia walked out on the stage and you could hear her little foot steps and nothing else. Thomas decided now would be a good time to speak his thoughts so he broke out in the "Australian National Anthem".
By the time we quieted him down Olivia had started to sing. She looked nervous before walking out and then just pulled herself together and decided to Roar! She nailed it and the first chair turned straight away (it was Joel and Benj Madden, from Good Charlotte, in a joint chair). Next Delta stood up and started dancing and then slammed her button and before Olivia's 90 seconds were over Mel B (spice girls) had also pushed her button! SHE HAD ALL THREE CHAIRS TURN!! We were over the moon and I couldn't believe it!
When she finished they started asking her questions. We didn't practice this!! I was so sure she wouldn't get through- that we had been set up, but I was wrong. She introduced herself and then she needed to ask them some questions to decide which judge to pick. Most kids ask questions like "who is your inspiration, where can you take me if I choose you?" etc...
She asked the Mel B if she believed in Santa Clause...
All the judges said Yes- but then Mel B took over and said she KNOWS Santa Clause and she has been to the North Pole! This lead to a full on debate between the two judges. Finally, someone asked if anyone from the audience was here for her. She said "NO- none of my friends are old enough" (they had to be 12 years old to sit in the audience). Just then her Grandpa (my dad) stood up in the audience and said "I'm here Olivia!" He was her only audience member present (we got several tickets- but had no one to invite).The spotlight went on my dad, Olivia yelled "that is my grandpa"- (here she is pointing to her grandpa)
and he came down to the stage to help her decide who to pick.
Olivia ultimately chose Delta as her coach. Delta picked her up and spun her around and Olivia honestly fell in love with Delta from then on.
The next day we were on a plane back to Melbourne. Here is Olivia with three other contestants. Olivia was the only one who went through. We were told the battle rounds would be in 6 weeks and to wait to find out the song and who she was singing against.
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