Baylor University student Holly Tucker impressed Blake Shelton with her audition song “To Make You Feel My Love”. She and Michelle Raitzin competed against each other in the battle rounds with Carrie Underwood’s “Blown Away”. It was a tough decision for Blake Shelton, but he decided to move forward with Holly. We chatted with her post-battle rounds via conference call. Follow her on Twitter @HollyTMusic.
Have you ever been in a situation where you competed head-to-head like that? And, was it difficult – as you’re preparing for your performance – knowing that the person that you’re working with is going to be your big competition?
Okay. First of all, I have never been in a situation like that where I have to sing a duet with somebody and basically sing for my life on the show. And that was very, very different for me. But, it was hard knowing that one of us may have to leave or get stolen onto another team and be separated. Because, Michelle and I, I think we formed one of the closest bonds out of all the battle partners just because we were also roommates.
Being roommates with Michelle, did that make the competition more difficult? Was it harder to practice at home or make it more awkward trying to rehearse knowing that your competition is literally in the next room?
You know, not really because – I mean, it should have. You’re completely right. It should’ve been really awkward and difficult to do with both of us here. But like I said, we had a really close relationship and so we were very respectful of each other. If we wanted to practice separately, we would go in separate rooms where we couldn’t hear each other. And if we wanted to practice together, we would work out the time in our schedules. We’re just very easy to work with I guess. So it was fun, rather than awkward.
Give us a sense of what practice is like. How much time do you guys spend working on the song that you’re singing day-to-day and the time up to the performances?
Well in the beginning when we first got the song, we practiced it a lot. We would go to the practice room for like an hour or so at a time maybe each day. Sometimes separate. Sometimes together. And – because like I said, we’re both perfectionists, so we really wanted to get it down well by the time it was going to get on stage. But then, towards the end, we were kind of over-rehearsing it. We were practicing it too much where it was starting to sound tired. And so coming to the stage, we had to bring a new, fresh energy to it, and I think just the adrenaline of the situation helped us to do that.
How much time do you have to spend contacting your fans on social media? And, is that a different experience than – when you’ve performed before, your fans are right there. You can talk with them physically after a performance.
Yes, social media is definitely a blessing that I didn’t know about much. I mean, I’m real oriented into Facebook, but Twitter was kind of new for me. I’m still learning. But, just from getting that small amount of exposure on TV, it’s crazy how much it all blew up for me. And I really had to keep up with it. I mean if you let it, I mean you can spend like hours at a time on it. You have to just kind of back away sometimes and be like, “This is not healthy.”
So – but I love every one of my fans because they’re just so encouraging to me. Like, they really keep me going with all their sweet comments and I couldn’t imagine better fans than – and it’s just been a blessing to have this whole experience and to meet all these new people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buZJyG_S2aE