Auditioning for America's Got Talent: The Process, The Nerves and How it Went!

So, my birthday was last month. All I wanted was to go audition for America's Got Talent. It's one of my absolutely favorite talent shows to watch and I really want to be on it some day. My parents said that we could drive to one of the audition cities that was nearest to us. The auditions in Houston were the closest that fit our schedule, but it was still an 8ish hour drive.

We left Friday morning, so I had to miss school, but the drive was pretty uneventful. I took a ton of snapchat videos that no one will probably ever watch :) After the freaking GPS took us to the wrong hotel, we finally found it and checked in, ordered pizza and pretty much just went to sleep.

Saturday morning we woke up and headed for the convention center where the auditions were. I was a little nervous, but not much. We weren't sure exactly how it was going to go and we were all a little nervous about having to stand in lines all day long. As it turns out, it went much faster than we expected.

We got there at 8:30 am and there was a sign in the lobby area that said, "America's Got Talent Front of the Line" and we were like second in line. I was really surprised, but then we had to wait for my dad so he didn't get left behind. He was a little excited, but not as much as my mom.

Then it was time to head upstairs. That's where the registration tables were. There were those straps that block off rows like at the bank or movie theater, but there was really only one row that had people in it. We were apparently early enough to get in early!

Then it was time to register. I had already registered online, which apparently wasn't necessary but it made the process a little bit faster anyway. My parents had to go with me since I'm under 18 and sign the paperwork and whatnot.

THEN we went into the "holding area" which was a great big room with a bunch of chairs just randomly sitting around for everyone. There were a bunch of random banners hanging on the walls that you could take photos in front of and a big dance floor type space for people to practice on and get more photos.

There were people with cameras, filming for the show. There was a woman with a microphone that would call out people's numbers (or rather a range of numbers) when it was your turn to go to your audition, but mostly she seemed to be there to get everyone hyped up. At one point she asked anyone with an instrument to stand on chairs and kind of play (but not too loud) and had everyone cheer or do their act, as long as it wasn't singing.

There was a HUGE group of dancers that were doing some really bomb ass stuff that my dad kept freaking out about (he was really impressed) and then a big group of people in kilts. They had bagpipes, drums and dancers. When they went up to practice, the lady with the microphone announced that they wanted to film their practice, so everyone needed to sit down and put their cameras away.

As soon as that was done, I was called to audition along with a bunch of other people. We then went to ANOTHER waiting area with rows of chairs and sat down to wait again. It wasn't long before we were called to our last waiting area. Only one parent could come along at that point, so my mom went with me.

We also couldn't take photos or film, but we went into a BIG room with one table at the end. A guy was sitting with a laptop at the table and we all sat in the chairs lined up against the wall (there were maybe a dozen of us in the room at one time). Then he told us that we'd get up, stand on the big red X on the floor, say our name, our age and what we were going to do or what song we were going to sing.

Everyone in that room sang, except for one guy who did a magic trick with cards. Everyone did really well, although one girl was so nervous that her voice was shaking and I felt so bad for her. Her voice was really really nice, but I felt bad that she was so nervous.

I sang "Jolene" and played the guitar and I think I did really well. The guy who was judging this part was singing along with me and kind of dancing in his seat, so at least I didn't totally suck!

Anyway, that was about it! We left and my dad went to pick up the car while my mom kept taking "artsy" shots of me outside. We were back on the road by noon, so it was actually pretty fast!

We don't get to find out if we made it to the next round until around the middle of January, so I guess I just get to do a lot of waiting now!!! :) It has been a great weekend anyway and now my dad and I are going to go chill and watch a movie. Wish me lots of luck!!!

Oh, and here is the only decent quality video I can find of me playing Jolene way back when I first learned the song. I've gotten better with practice since then, but you can still hear it if you want to!

And I've now recorded the song for the steemit open mic challenge as well: