Auditions for Nashville Star draw more than 100 contestants to Stump's Supper Club and Howl at the Moon.
By BRADY DENNIS
Published November 11, 2003
Gina Lynn Fratto sings a cappella on a shag-carpeted stage for a chance to compete for a recording contract with Sony Music Nashville. Those who survived Monday's cuts will sing again today.
[Times photo: Thomas C. Goethe]
[Times photo: Thomas C. Goethe]
David Darr sings for Nashville Star judges. More than 100 contestants showed up at Channelside on Monday to audition for the show.
TAMPA - They came with big dreams and even bigger belt buckles. They sang about bar fights and cowboys, about good-hearted women and good-timing men.
In a room full of Bud Lights, sweet tea, banana pudding and corn bread, the dreamers had 30 seconds each to prove they could sing. And sing well.
No music. No lyrics flashing across a screen. Just a microphone, a disco ball turning slowly overhead and the hope of earning a ticket to Nashville for a moment in the honky-tonk spotlight.
More than 100 contestants showed up at Channelside on Monday to audition for the second season of Nashville Star.
The television show (think American Idol with steel guitars and original songwriting tossed in) takes 12 finalists from across the nation and promises the winner a contract with Sony Music Nashville.
Only 30 singers from Monday's contest, held at Stump's Supper Club and Howl at the Moon, will move on to today's second round. By Wednesday, only two winners will move on to a regional competition.
But on Monday, the mike was open to anyone.
Plenty of folks came, some dressed in stereotypical country fashion - cowboy hats, leather boots, NASCAR caps, mullet haircuts and a tattoo here or there.
But just as many looked as if they'd missed the turn for Miami Beach - slick hair, tight black pants, shiny half-buttoned shirts and sunglasses on indoors.
The look doesn't matter, most of them agreed. It all boils down to the music. They sang songs by the Dixie Chicks, Toby Keith, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Eagles, John Mellencamp and others.
Hoyt Hughes, 39, usually sticks to George Jones and Travis Tritt. But on Monday, the Lakeland man stepped to the mike and belted out an old Merle Haggard tune, Workin' Man Blues.
After all, he's a workin' man himself.
"I just got off the night shift, and I'm off today anyway, so I figured what the heck," said Hughes, who's worked at a power plant for 17 years. "I'd been hem-hawing about it all the way until this morning."
He promised he won't hem-haw if they ask him to go to Nashville.
"I'd freeze my retirement," he said. "I might miss the people (at work). But I won't miss the shifts."
Some singers realized that performing a cappella in front of an audience isn't quite as comfortable as a laid-back karaoke session with friends.
"It's not like karaoke. There are no words up there," said J.R. Strickland. The Tampa woman sang When Will I Be Loved. "I didn't feel like I was nervous. But I think I sounded like I was nervous."
Scott Parlett, clad in black boots and black cowboy hat, knows how to tame his nerves. Two Bud Lights, and the 28-year-old Plant City schoolteacher was ready to croon.
"All my friends say I sound all right," said Parlett, who owns his own karaoke machine and has entered other singing contests. "I'm a ham. I get a rush (being onstage). Why not give it a shot? Whatever happens, happens."
One by one, the dreamers climbed onto the shag-carpeted stage and, like Parlett, gave it a shot. Then they went home and waited for a phone call asking them to return today.
At last the stage was empty, the mike silent and not a cowboy hat in sight. Stump's returned to normal, and a Beatles song played on the stereo.
Gina Lynn Fratto sings a cappella on a shag-carpeted stage for a chance to compete for a recording contract with Sony Music Nashville. Those who survived Monday's cuts will sing again today.
