Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Cay Aliese from American Idol Season 21

In fact, she’ll be featured in a special audition epsiode set to air Sunday after the Oscars end (about 11:30 p.m. on ABC).

Here’s more about Cay:

* She’s a 24-year-old singer-songwriter from Dandridge, Tenn., who’s already released music.

* She also writes on Instagram that she’s the married mother of two, a stay-at-home mom who ran “as many side hustles as I could to help make ends meet” before recently taking her first full-time job in social media marketing.

* Writes Cay: “My dream is big, but it’s never bigger than my little family. I have hopes to travel the world and worship alongside as many people as possible with my little family.”

* In fact, in addition to releasing solo music, she performs in a worship group called The Deep Worship, or The Deep for short.

* She’s the daughter of former The Voice contestant Nolan Neal, who shared his struggle with addiction on Season 10 and turned four chairs in the Season 11 blind auditions.

* Neal died in July 2022 at age 41. The singer, who also appeared on America’s Got Talent, died of a drug overdose, according to the coroner’s report.

* Four days after his death, Cay posted a lovely musical tribute to her dad on Facebook, writing “I wish my dad could’ve heard me sing this before he died.”

* In a recent interview with the Knoxville News Sentinel, Cay admitted she’s struggled with her own musical ambitions.

* “Honestly, throughout my life, I’ve had moments where I was like, ‘Yes, music!’ And then I would just be like, ‘No, I don’t want to go down the path hat my dad went down. I’m not ready to do music. I don’t want to do it,'” she says in that interview. “But when he passed away, I was like, ‘OK, this is what I want to do,’ and American Idol was an opportunity. I was like, ‘I’m either gonna dive right into this, or I’m gonna shy away from it and never do anything with my dreams. So, I did it!'”

* And she’s already released impressive music, dropping five singles — all songs see wrote — since September. Be sure to check out “Polish All the Pieces” and “Send Me a Butterfly.”

* Her latest, “Steady Girl,” came out Saturday. You can check it out below. Explains Cay on Instagram: “When it says ‘steady girl keep your love’ it’s not saying hold it inside, it’s my reminder to you to KEEP YOUR LOVE. Keep your big heart! Don’t change a thing about your loving spirit. Don’t let the pain in life crush you and take away what makes you YOU. So, Steady Girl, keep your love. The best hearts are the ones people try to mess up.”

* A perfect message from a young lady who describes herself as “just a girl tryin’ to break the cycle and be a light to the world.”

Cay on social media:
Instagram
TikTok
Twitter
Facebook
YouTube