Junior Kayla Taitz appeared on Tuesday’s episode of “Opening Act.” She got the performing gig after she submitted a YouTube video of herself singing “Lips of an Angel” by Hinder.
Most YouTube cover artists can only expect to broadcast their music from their bedrooms to a few loyal fans and browsers. Kayla Taitz was no different.
The junior communication major dreamed of a day when a music producer would recognize her talent and present an opportunity to her. She didn’t expect that day to come just a week after her first attempt to get noticed. But this summer, Taitz beat out more than 250 aspiring musicians to take to the stage in Hollywood and sing before a live audience as a featured performer in the reality show Opening Act.
Her journey, which culminated in a performance for the show’s season finale Tuesday night, began about a year ago when she posted her first video to YouTube. Though that song, an original work called “Can’t Sleep,” has only 4,000 views, some of her 54 videos have garnered more than 150,000 hits. Taitz has been singing her whole life and has been practicing guitar since the end of high school. Facing stiff competition to succeed as a professional musician, she has worked hard to build an audience on YouTube by singing men’s songs, performing tracks that haven’t been formally released and writing melodies to raps.
In July, she decided to take a chance and submit a video to the Opportunity Rocks sweepstakes, a contest she saw advertised online, for the chance to experience the star treatment in Hollywood.
The competition required all contestants to pick a song from an approved list and send in a video of their performance. Taitz chose to play and sing “Lips of an Angel” by Hinder — while the song doesn’t match her musical tastes, she thought it would set her apart. For Taitz, breaking into the music business is about strategy.
“I wanted to stand out, so I didn’t pick a song that I would normally choose,” she said. “I chose this song because I knew that a lot of other girls in the competition wouldn’t.”
Taitz said she hadn’t expected to see a result so soon after submitting her audition. But after a week-long voting period to decide the top 10, the show’s producers — including Nigel Lythgoe — notified her she was the winning contender. Taitz said friends and members of her sorority, Alpha Omicron Pi, supported her each time she posted a new video to YouTube by visiting the site daily.
“She definitely has the talent,” said junior kinesiology major Tricia Almeida, a member of Taitz’s sorority. “People just need to see it.”
Three days after the announcement, camera crews came to film in Taitz’s hometown of Rockville, and soon after, she hopped a plane with her best friend from home for a week of professional makeovers by the contest’s sponsor, CoverGirl, followed by video shoots and the filmed performance at the Universal CityWalk Stage. The finale showed footage of Taitz’s journey from Rockville to Hollywood and pointed viewers to watch her performance online.
“It all happened so fast. One minute I was hoping and dreaming and the next minute it was a reality,” Taitz said. “The whole time I was in Los Angeles, I just kept asking myself, ‘How is this real?’”
That dedication paid off for Taitz in the Opportunity Rocks contest, which granted her a performance in the new series Opening Act, a show that surprised other YouTube artists with the news that they would open for a star in concert. In the show’s finale Tuesday, Taitz joined those contenders for a final performance.
Sophomore neurobiology and physiology major Susan Lubejko, also a member of her sorority, said it was exciting to gather in the sorority house with Taitz to watch her premiere Tuesday night.
“This is such a big dream for her,” Lubejko added. “All of us in the sorority really support her.”
Almeida said it was gratifying for her friend’s talent to gain recognition beyond the campus and her YouTube channel.
“She’s so passionate and so dedicated, and I am optimistic that this is going to open a lot of doors for her,” she said.
doanemalotte@umdbk.com
