We met Lindita in the Season 15 premiere, learning how she lost 150 pounds in her journey toward a singing career.
“In my hometown, when I started singing, a lot of people were like, ‘She has a nice voice, but she’s really fat,'” Lindita, 26, told Idol. “As a teenager that does touch you emotionally a lot. So it came to the point where I said, ‘I can make a change for myself.'”
So she showed up on the Idol stage showing off a good bit of her trimmer body.
Then she impressed the judges with a powerhouse performance of “It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World” during which she showed she knows a thing or two about how to impress with a sustained glory note.
Jennifer Lopez said she was impressed with Lindita’s vocal firepower and confidence, and the young woman got a unanimous vote to advance to the Hollywood round.
As for that background, Lindita — real name Linda Halimi — is from Kosovo. She tells us on Facebook that she started singing back in 2003 and her parents enrolled her in a music school.
She eventually became a finalist in an Albanian Idol competition around 2005, then joined a band before returning to a solo career in 2009. She and her husband moved to the U.S. in 2013.
According to her Twitter bio, she sings in 10 languages. She released a U.S. single, “Cold World,” as an independent artist in June. You can check out the accompanying music video below.
On Facebook, she writes: “2015 was a year full of hard work in silence, so don’t be surprised of all the noise and loudness from me in 2016 .. I am ready, I am more than prepared, to play the starring role on the show of my life, until now, I was working on learning the script and perfecting the show.”
She’s off to a good start. The YouTube video of her audition is the third most watched so far, with more than 700,000 views, trailing only those from teens Tristan McIntosh and Jeneve Mitchell.
You can follow Lindita on her Facebook page. On Twitter, she is @LinditaWorld.
“Cold World” — music video for 2015 single
Cover of Adele’s “Hello”
Leave a reply