Meet Amy Vachal of The Voice Season 9

The Voice

October 8, 2015 By Mark Franklin 0

Her audition: Amy Vachal, 26, of Brooklyn, N.Y., auditioned with “Dream a Little Dream.” As she hit the chorus, all three coaches with spots left on their team — Pharrell Williams, Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton — turned their chairs. Adam Levine told her he thinks she could win the show; Blake called her a potential “superstar.” Amy opted to join Team Pharrell.

Her background: Amy says her dad was part of a Grateful Dead cover band while she was growing up and adds that she always wanted to be just like him. She says she has always loved music, painting and the arts. She attended Swarthmore College, majoring in economics and studio arts. After graduating, she decided she wanted a career in singing and sold a couple of her painting inspired by New York to move to that city. These days, she says she “gigs as much as I can.” When questioned about her style of music by Pharrell, Amy said she’s inspired by the old crooners, but wants “to make a new hybrid.”

What the show didn’t show: Amy was a soccer and lacrosse player at Swarthmore College, but suffered what she calls “an intense concussion” during the spring of her senior year. While recovering, she wrote her first four songs. Until that point, she says she was something of a “secret singer.” And after moving to New York to pursue a career in music, there was a point when the city “totally broke me down,” she admits in an interview you can watch here. She wound up alone on a bison farm in Texas in a writing residency and credits that with much of her spiritual growth as an artist.

Today, that secret singer is hardly a secret. She has two EPs to her credit, the latest released in November of 2014. And her blind audition performance of “Dream a Little Dream” drew some of the highest praise of the Season 9 blind auditions — such high praise that Amy admitted in a conference call with the media that “I had a lot of trouble believing the things that they were saying. But, you know, in retrospect I’m still letting that work on me.”

Amy said she came across “Dream a Little Dream” in college and immediately fell in love with the song because of its beautiful melody and lyrics. “After choosing this song, I started to realize just how there actually was a pretty strong parallel to what we’re all daring to do in stepping on to that audition stage. So that brought on a stronger meaning. I’m a big fan of the song, and I think it was perfect for this (blind audition) for me.”

Fans seemed to agree. It was the most popular song on iTunes from the final night of the blind auditions, reaching number 45 on the iTunes singles chart. In fact, only one blind audition song — “Thank You” by Andi and Alex — did better during the Season 9 blind auditions.

Amy says she would describe her own music as “old-timey, indie-pop.”

“Any artist knows you’re always evolving and you’re always trying to get to that perfect sound,” she added. “The process of this show is really going to help me just to probe into that in deeper ways. I just know that I’m honing in on what I feel to be my most true genre.”

For links to profile blogs on every singer who has landed a spot on Season 9 of The Voice, head here.

On iTunes: Amy released a four-track EP called “Appleseed” in 2011 that is playfully charming; a song called “Catapult” was released as a single. She released a second EP of five tracks in November called “Crinkle Bloom.”

Update:
Battle round: Defeated the duo of Jubal and Amanda singing “To Love Somebody.” The song hit #187 on the iTunes’s singles chart, the eighth best of the battle round.
Knockout round: She sang “Sunday Kind of Love,” which turned out to be the night’s most popular song on iTunes, hitting number 34. she lost the knockout to Madi Davis, but joined Team Adam after Adam Levine and Blake Shelton tried to steal her.
Live playoffs: She sang “The Way You Look Tonight.” The song hit number 29 on iTunes, seventh best among 24 live playoff songs. But Amy needed the Team Adam save to make the Top 12.
Top 12: She performed a stripped down version of “Hotline Bling.” The song hit number 6 on the iTunes Top 200 and number 4 on the pop singles chart. Amy was voted into the Top 11.
Top 11: She covered Taylor Swift’s “Blank Space” with great success. The song wound up being the week’s most popular on iTunes, hitting number four and marking the first time any artist topped Jordan Smith on the charts. Amy was voted into the Top 10.
Top 10: She sang “Bye Bye Bye” and hit number eight on the iTunes Top 200, sixth best of the night. She was voted into the Top 9.
Top 9: She sang “To Make You Feel My Love.” The song hit number six on the iTunes Top 200, five best of the night. But Amy landed in the bottom three in fan voting and was eliminated from the show.