Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Eleven minors landed spots on Season 9 of The Voice, including Shelby Brown, who had all four coaches turn their chairs for her blind audition. Sydney Rhame (below) might have accomplished the same if she hadn’t auditioned when three teams were already filled.(NBC Photo)

Wow, he wasn’t joking.

Turns out the Season 9 cast is one of the show’s youngest ever, with 11 singers who were minors back when they auditioned.

Only one season of The Voice has featured more under-18s. And that was Season 3, when each coach took on 16 singers, giving The Voice a cast of 64 artists compared to the 48 that has since become the norm.

And unlike Danielle Bradbery, who seemingly came out of nowhere to win Season 4, many of these singers fall more into the Sawyer Fredericks’ category in terms of pre-Voice experience.

Let’s take a team by team look at where those minors landed. Follow the links, and you’ll find a profile blog on each singer.

Team Pharrell Williams: He coached Sawyer to victory. Perhaps more impressively, he coached Koryn Hawthorne into last year’s finals. Now he’s got more minors than any other coach with four talented young ladies on his team. They include Madi Davis and Sydney Rhame, both of whom have already released a pair of EPs at the tender age of 16. They include Siahna Im, who turned in a very impressive blind audition performance of “Fever.” And they include “cantaloupe girl” Ivonne Acero, who returned to The Voice stage vastly improved after a no-turn performance in Season 8.

Team Adam Levine: Eleven minors made the Season 9 cast, but only one of those turned four chairs. That would be Shelby Brown, whose cover of “Stars” was also one of the most successful blind audition songs on iTunes. Amanda Ayala is a talented pop-rocker who will apparently be matched up against Shelby in the battle round; that should be fun to watch. And Adam also picked up Chance Pena and then gloated that the other coaches would be sorry they didn’t turn for the 15-year-old Texan.

Team Blake Shelton: Blake might not have landed Shelby Brown, but he did wind up with two very talented young country singers in Zach Seabaugh and Emily Ann Roberts. It’ll be interesting to see how they fare against their more experienced country counterparts on his team. The team also includes Cole Criske, the guy who’s from the same town as Season 1 contestant Xenia, who was just a teen when Blake coached her into the Top 8.

Team Gwen: Gwen Stefani kept making the “I’m a mother” pitch during the blind auditions, to little avail. She wound up with just one minor on her team. That said, he might be the most experienced of the bunch, even though he’s Season 9’s youngest. He’s Braiden Sunshine, 15, who’s been performing in bands since age 9 and already has been a singer on two albums.

For those wondering, The Voice had 13 minors among its cast back in Season 3.

The seasons with the fewest minors include Season 2 with just three and Season 4 with just five.

The battle rounds begin Monday night. Check back then, I’ll be live blogging throughout.

And I’ll be posting more on The Voice between now and then.

For profiles of all the singers to land spots on The Voice Season 9, head here.