Like any contestant who tries out for “The Voice,” Johnnie Kapua wondered if he’d be able to get a coach to turn around for him during his blind audition.
His question got answered just a few seconds into his performance of Bruno Mars’ and Lady Gaga’s “Die With a Smile.” Kelly Clarkson was quick to turn around. Queen Latifah immediately followed.
The 32-year-old singer, who lives in Herriman, Utah, was surprised — but not for the reason you might think.
Johnnie Kapua gets surprised during ‘Voice’ audition
Kapua had known it was a possibility someone could turn around, so even though he doesn’t consider himself to be the most confident singer, he wasn’t necessarily surprised by that.
What did surprise him, though, was the absence of the dramatic whooshing sound that the millions of viewers watching “The Voice” hear anytime a coach pushes the button to turn around their chair.
“When you’re actually performing and you’re there live, there’s no sound!” Kapua recently told the Deseret News. “I was expecting that a big sound would happen, and that would maybe throw me off a little bit.”
But for Kapua, it was the lack of sound that was the big distraction. He did his best to move past that surprise and keep on singing. And then, when the song was over, he had a nerve-wracking realization.
As Clarkson, Latifah, Adam Levine and Riley Green stared at him from their big red swivel chairs, Kapua, who at first was simply relieved to be done with his performance, remembered he now actually had to talk to the celebrity coaches.
Johnnie Kapua talks to the celebrity coaches during his audition for “The Voice.” | Griffin Nagel/NBC
“I was like, ‘Oh shoot, I really have not thought this through!’” he said with a laugh. “I couldn’t comprehend what I was going to say. I didn’t run that scenario through my mind.”
Kapua was actually more nervous about talking to the coaches than he was singing — he says he forgot his name at one point.
“The judges kind of had to carry the conversation, and my wife, we had this conversation right afterwards, she’s like, ‘What were you doing? Why weren’t you talking?’ I’m like, ‘I didn’t even know what to say!’”
In the end, though, he didn’t have to say too much.
Clarkson hit her “First In Button” — a new feature on the show that allows the coach who turned around first the chance to snag that singer for their team.
So Kapua automatically joined Team Kelly.
His time on “The Voice” ended Tuesday night during the Battle round, although Clarkson had high praise for him. Now, the Utah singer is figuring out how to make music a bigger part of his life.
An ‘anomaly’ on ‘The Voice’
Before going on “The Voice,” Kapua considered himself a casual singer.
His desire to play the guitar and sing started back in high school as a way to woo girls. Over the years, he would sing at an occasional family or church gathering, but it wasn’t something he’d ever considered as a career.
Kapua, who studied project management at Ensign College, said he felt like an “impostor” at the start of his time on “The Voice.” Surrounded by contestants who had been navigating the music industry for years, or who had played on big stages, he described himself as an “anomaly.”
Johnnie Kapua performs during the Battle round of “The Voice.” | Cory Osborne/NBC
But those feelings of inadequacy waned as he bonded with his fellow contestants. Even in a competitive environment, the contestants lifted each other up and created a sense of family amid filming, he said.
Winning over Clarkson and Latifah — his top two picks for a coach — offered even more validation.
“Overall, I was just overwhelmed by the fact that they had really nice things to say about me and my singing,” Kapua said. “‘Cause again, I wouldn’t say I’m a singer, so to have professional singers, especially someone like Kelly, who’s just a powerhouse in the singing industry … use her first-in (button) was pretty cool.”
Joining Clarkson’s team was somewhat of a lightning bolt moment for Kapua.
“It made a switch in my mind,” he said. “Like, ‘Oh, dude, you can actually sing.’”
What’s next for Johnnie Kapua after ‘The Voice’?
Johnnie Kapua performs with Anna McElroy during the Battle round of “The Voice.” | Cory Osborne/NBC
During Tuesday night’s Battle round, Clarkson faced a hard decision.
Kapua and his fellow Team Kelly member, Anna McElroy, had just performed “Some Things I’ll Never Know” by Teddy Swims feat. Maren Morris. Clarkson had high praise for both singers — “You have this special tone about you that I just fall in love with every time you open your mouth,” she told Kapua.
But she had to eliminate someone.
The “Voice” coach made it clear she wanted to keep in touch with whoever she ended up eliminating and help them move forward in the industry. That person ended up being Kapua.
Knowing that Clarkson is in his corner means the world to Kapua.
Now, back in Herriman, the singer is adjusting to life with a baby (his wife, who actually signed him up for “The Voice,” was 36 weeks pregnant at the time of his audition).
He’s also got a full-time job in sales, but after his time on “The Voice,” Kapua wants music to be a bigger part of his life.
“I feel like I’m still like a kid when it comes to the music side,” he said. “So I don’t know what it looks like.”
Kapua does really want to sing the national anthem at a BYU football game, which would also mark his first time ever attending a football game — “I’m a disgrace, I know,” he said with a laugh.
He also wants to embrace performance opportunities in his homeland of New Zealand, and help to represent his culture on a larger stage.
But in the meantime, he’s celebrating his run on “The Voice,” and the fact that his two older kids, ages 7 and 5, got to watch him in the spotlight.
“What I’m most proud of, outside of my marriage, is being a dad,” he said. “The goal is for my kids to be able to see their dad do something that he was very terrified of doing, and, you know, have that transfer into their own mind that they can do hard things, too.”