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Watch this stunning rendition of Jordan Smith, winner of the Voice performing the National Anthem

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Gobucks2204's picture
January 3, 2016 at 10:19am
36 Comments

First off a shout out to John Cooper's Lucky Pig for all his musical history posts he takes time to put together for us.

TL/DR: Under dog story of kid nailing the National Anthem.

Let me preface this post by saying I don't normally watch shows like Dancing With The Stars, or America's Got Talent (hope my man card remains intact) but I initially saw this dude from a video of one of his winning performances on a news aggregate site. I was blown away and kept tabs on him as he went on to destroy all comers on this past season of The Voice.

Jordan Smith is a 22 y/o young man from Harlan, Kentucky and is attending Lee University which is known for its very strong musical program. His parents and family all have a strong musical background which he was immersed in since childhood. 

Long story short, Jordan has talked about how he would get teased for his voice (which is high for a man) and his appearance (being overweight). Oftentimes people are absolutely blown away by his music because he doesn't look and act like a typical performer. Gwen Stefani was absolutely schocked after his performance because as Jordan has even said, he doesn't look like what people would think he would look like from hearing his singing voice. People would mistake him for a woman at a drive through and stuff like that and he has just had to learn to accept himself over time despite people being nasty at times to him and making fun of him.

He flat out dominated the whole season of the Voice singing everything from Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, to Queen's Somebody to Love and even a rendition of an old hymn after the Paris shootings Great is Thy Faithfulness. I'll share a few clips in a moment.

Rendition of Great is thy Faithfulness after the Paris shootings.

Jordan's cover of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah

Cover of Queen's Somebody to Love.

After his performance on the Voice he has had many doors openend to him. On Saturday he was invited to sing the National Anthem at the Kentucky Ole Miss basketball game (he and his parents are longtime fans of Kentucky). Granted I don't like Big Blue Nation but I couldn't help but appreciate his rendition of the Star Spangled Banner which gave me chills. The National Anthem is one of the hardest songs to sing in front of people and many souls have crashed and burned over the years in the crucible of the moment.

Jordan sang it acappella, flat out killing it in a drop the mic moment and walked off and gave the Kentucky mascot a high five to thousands of fans cheering his performance. I just enjoy feel good underdog stories like his. After winning the season of the Voice he is signed with Republic records and already has all of his recordings from the Voice for sale on iTunes and at Walmart. Some of his songs shot to number one on ITUNES passing Adele and garnering millions of hits on YouTube. He also just got engaged to his girlfriend of three years so it's been quite a year for him.

His vocal range will blow you away (he is a tenor) but he hits some crazy high notes at the end of the song and the crowd went nuts. I hope you enjoy this clip of Jordan nailing the National Anthem. I don't care what he looks like or sounds like, the dude is a baller. I'm hoping he will get the chance to sing it at the Super Bowl this year. In addition to his performance in Rupp arena, he just did a hockey game last week as well. We all get jaded and our hearts can run the risk of growing cold but Jordan's story should give you an uplift as we forge into the New Year.

Here is a clip of his performance.

 

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