Meet 2026’s ‘American Idol’ Top 11 Finalists

Born: Jan. 6, 2003 – Baltimore, Maryland
Musical Influences: The Beatles, Justin Vernon
How He Listens to Music: Apple Music, YouTube, record player
First Idol Experience: “My family loved it. It was always on the TV, but I wasn’t as intrigued early on. I was so driven toward sports. I didn’t love it as much as I do now.”
Favorite Alums: Thunderstorm Artis, Sam Barber, Cameron Whitcomb

Brooks’ earliest memory of music is going to see his sister, who is two years older, perform in stage musicals. But there was also a lot of music in his home. “My mother played piano. She played a lot of classical. My father was always playing harmonica.” He also listened to SiriusXM, and radio station 104.3 in Maryland. “A lot of Beatles, a lot of Grateful Dead. My mom is a huge hippie. My dad loved blues, so I grew up around it and fell in love with the blues.”

Brooks didn’t really think about playing music until recently. “I was an athlete, playing soccer my whole life, until I had an injury, I ripped my back in half and then COVID hit. Then I started playing guitar and singing at the same time.”

He explains that growing up, he was too shy to perform. “I watched from behind the scenes when my sister performed and saw how she could walk on stage, be herself, and walk off and it was a job to her. I looked up to her.”

During the pandemic, he decided to learn guitar. “As soon as I started, I knew I wanted to learn to sing, too. Every day I would be practicing and then I realized I really wanted to do this.”

Brooks had a career picked out and it wasn’t being a musician – but it was close. He attended Community College of Baltimore County, studying audio technology. “I was going to be behind the scenes, mixing and doing recording and I realized halfway through that I was hiding. I really wanted to be the one being recorded. But I got to learn behind the scenes, because I could always use that.”

From his time on Idol so far, Brooks tells Billboard he has learned self-worth and self-confidence. “Believing in yourself. Everyone here, all the contestants and their families, they’re all family to me now, They’re so supportive. The biggest thing they taught me is just be you.”

Brooks recalls his audition and what one judge’s comment meant to him. “I had no confidence going in. I had no clue how it was going to go. I think I was the last audition of one of the days and the whole day I was just freaking out. Anxiety through the roof. Seeing people walk out either crying or walk out with a Golden Ticket. I’d never done anything like this before. I’ve always just been on a soccer team, and this was a solo mission, Luke Bryan said, ‘I just want to hear more.’ It was amazing.”

Viewers of season 24 already know that Brooks works at a memory care facility. “Memory care is just so special to me. When I first started, I fell in love with it instantly. It’s hard. It takes a toll on your mental health, but it makes you feel so good when you go home at night or you work a long weekend. And these moments for the residents, they’re not going to remember them, but you can really make their day in just a minute. And the guitar that I used for my audition belonged to one of my patients who passed and handed it down to me so that was a big moment for me.

“He was the first person I ever played in front of, two months before my audition. He had a guitar in his room and he had a lot of bad days and the only way he could smile was to hear music. He loved the blues and that reminded me of my dad, so I would take him to his room and play Stevie Ray Vaughan or Jimi Hendrix and he would fall in love with that. When he passed, his wife said he wanted me to have the guitar and I thought, ‘Yes, I should play that for my audition.’”

Born: Nov. 19, 1999 – Poplar Bluff, Missouri
Musical Influences: Lee Ann Womack, Shania Twain, Jo Dee Messina, The Isaacs, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver
How She Consumes Music: Spotify
First Idol Experience: “I didn’t grow up with TV, so I didn’t know American Idol existed until I was older. My earliest memory is of Simon Cowell. I would look up Idol fails and those are my favorite ones to watch.”
Favorite Alums: Breanna Nix, Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Tori Kelly
Who She’d Like to Duet with: Dolly Parton

Life at home in rural Missouri has already changed for Hannah Harper. “I’m not allowed to go to Walmart anymore. My husband makes me sit in the car. I post a lot of videos without makeup, so it’s not like I can wash my face and go out and people won’t recognize me. Everyone knows bare face or with makeup who I am. People come up to me everywhere. It’s so weird. Out in California, nobody knows who I am, but in Missouri, because it’s such a low population, everybody and their brother knows that I’m on the show and they’re rooting for me. So out and about is like a meet and greet every time.”

Music has been a part of her life since birth. “My mom and dad traveled with their family, the Harper Family. My grandparents also had a band, the Bob Lewis Family. My grandpa was the patriarch of that. He had seven kids. They all did the music thing. So when I was born, it was always there. There was always a banjo. There was always some kind of noise in the house. I didn’t start dabbling myself until I was around nine and that’s when I got interested. And my dad always said if you don’t want a kid to learn how to play, put them in a room full of instruments and say don’t touch them, and that worked well. The fiddle was my first instrument, and I played it for several years in our family band. I haven’t picked one up in 15 years now.”

Harper never took music lessons. Her family called it learning under pressure. “My dad and mom taught me the basics of how to hold (a guitar). I had a few people show me some things on the fiddle, but my brother came off the road because he had Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He was doing chemo and my dad said, ‘We have a show this weekend. Here’s the guitar.’ I had seven days to learn it. I sat in my room and cried until I did. We made it through.”

While music was always going to be present in her life, after her second child was born, Harper went to school to be a physical therapist. “I only had a couple more months of clinicals and I would’ve been done but I decided that I’d rather be a stay-at-home mom. I didn’t ever see myself doing music outside of the family band, because that was the unit forever.

“I was a worship leader for seven years and then I was posting stuff on TikTok – cleaning videos, and in one of my cleaning videos, I sang and someone commented, ‘We just want singing videos. Stop cleaning.’ So I started focusing more on that and it made me see that there was more demand and that my voice could be heard. It made me want to pursue (a) solo (career) and here I am. Harper’s three children, aged six, four and two, are all with her during her Idol run.

“It’s very hard. Each morning when I leave for call time, I can hear them hollering all the way to the elevator because they want me. It wouldn’t be doable if I didn’t have a village of people making it happen. I have family members coming out each week to help my husband, who is here. My husband is a full-time dad now. He quit his job so that I could pursue this and so if you have a team of people backing you and the Lord behind you, then it’s going to happen, but it’s definitely a challenge.”

Born: Sept. 19, 1996 – Kokomo, Indiana
Musical Influences: Norah Jones; Stevie Nicks; Lindsey Buckingham; Adele; Rihanna; Amy Winehouse; Sarah McLachlan; Bonnie Raitt; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
How She Consumes Music: Vinyl, Spotify
First Idol Experience: Started watching season 1
Favorite Alums: Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Phillip Phillips, Adam Lambert, Clay Aiken, Ruben Studdard

This is not the first time Kyndal Inskeep has been sent to Hollywood Week. “As a young girl, my siblings and I would (play American Idol). Someone would be Simon Cowell, someone would be Paula Abdul, someone would be Randy Jackson and I was always the contestant. I’d get mixed reviews sometimes and other times I would make it to Hollywood. It’s very full circle now.”

Music has been in the Inskeep family “forever,” according to the Indiana native. “My mother was in a band before she had me and then chose to be a mom. She sang and my father played drums in a band and sang as well. I grew up listening to all kinds of different music – very eclectic.”

Her parents knew about their daughter’s musical talent at an early age. “I would wake them up at four o’clock in the morning after writing a song on the piano they gave me for Christmas and I would put on a show, ‘Kyndal, go to bed,’ they would tell me.’ I wrote my first song when I was six, called ‘Wendy Ride a Horse.’ Later, when my sixth grade boyfriend kissed my middle school best friend I wrote ‘Stupid Mistakes.’”

Inskeep says when she was eight, making mudpies in her cul-de-sac, her mother asked her if she was serious about music, and if she was, they would arrange for her to have guitar lessons. “Fun fact about me,” she tells Billboard. “I didn’t like it when people told me what to do, so I briefly took guitar lessons. I briefly took piano lessons. I was in the band in middle school, but I was one of those people that would sit down for hours and listen until I figured it out.”

She was 12 when SoundCloud was first available. “I recorded a version of Rihanna’s ‘Diamonds’ on my iPod Touch and put it on SoundCloud and got 100,000 views.” Inskeep also sang at the church where her mother was a worship leader and in school talent shows. “I was the freshman soloist in what was the next boy and girl group, Central Sound. I never wanted to be a lawyer or a doctor. There were many different ways I figured out that music was my thing.”

Inskeep attended Belmont University in Nashville “for maybe seven days. I was in the commercial voice program and it was not for me. I moved to Los Angeles and that didn’t work.” Then, a return to Nashville. “Now I’m here.”

Two years ago, she tried out for American Idol while Katy Perry was still a judge. “I got a Golden Ticket. I walked out because it wasn’t time. This year, the opportunity presented itself again,” says the 29-year-old. “This is the last year I could do this and I thought, let’s do it. And I’m in the top 14, so I listened correctly.”

Born: Jan. 7, 2000 – LaGrange, Georgia
Musical Influences: Marvin Gaye, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder, James Brown, Aerosmith, Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Allman Brothers
How He Listens to Music: Apple Music, YouTube, radio (Eagle 102.3 in LaGrange)
First Idol Experience: “When Steven Tyler was a judge. I was a huge Steven Tyler fan.”
Favorite Alums: Jamal Roberts, Iam Tongi, Filo
Who He’d Like to Duet with: Elvis Presley

Philmon Lee’s introduction to music when he was three years old was traveling on a bus with his father, who was in a rock n’ roll group. “He did a lot of local shows and was in a band called Hired Guns. They played a lot of motorcycle rallies.”

Hanging out with his dad helped Lee recognize his own talent. “When a CD was playing, he would sing to me and help me out with pitch. At 10, I was listening to a lot of Motown and formed my own sound.”

Asked what instruments he played, Lee explained, “I wanted to be a drummer when I was little. My dad bought me a drum kit and I used to play on that in the garage. My dad always played guitar. I said, ‘Dad, I want a guitar of my own.’ He said if I learned this intro to a Guns N’ Roses song, he would buy me one. It felt nearly impossible, but after a couple of days, I learned the intro. He took me to Guitar Center. My first semester in college, I picked up piano and now piano is my main thing.”

Music was always option A, Lee tells Billboard. It was also option B and C. “I had jobs to fill the void. I did a lot of part-time work like construction on houses and most recently I was an insurance broker. Not something I want to do for the rest of my life.”

Now 26, this season was not Lee’s first time auditioning for American Idol. “When I was 15, my grandparents drove me to Savannah, Georgia. There was a huge ice rink with a line all the way out the door. We waited all day and I was nervous. After forever, we got into the arena and I sang ‘Who’s Lovin’ You’ by Michael Jackson [originally by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles]. The producers told me it wasn’t the right time. My dad always told me I was going to get a million noes before I would get the right yes. At 15, I was bummed out, like it was the end of the world. Now I’m in this chair talking to you. It’s a full-circle moment.”

Lee says the most important thing he has learned on his Idol journey so far is to enjoy the moment, “If I go home the next round, I’m proud of myself and the people I’ve formed relationships with. I’ve made lifelong friends.”

Born: Dec. 11, 2007 – Gallatin, Tennessee
Musical Influences: John Mayer, Hank Williams
How He Listens to Music: Vinyl, Apple Music, YouTube
Favorite Alums: Jamal Roberts, Slater Nalley
Who He’d Like to Duet with: John Mayer

Lucas Leon says he was always fascinated with music. “It started when I was singing my ABCs and my sister said, ‘Hey, that’s above average!’ and I thought I could start doing some music. When I got a little older, I took piano lessons. I stayed with that a long time and started singing around eight. I picked up the guitar around 2020.”

Leon sang in church when he was young. After getting comfortable playing guitar, he started playing local gigs in 2022, mostly singing cover songs.

“It was an obsession – I couldn’t put down the guitar or stop playing the piano. One of the first things I ever did in public was at a little barbecue joint in Hendersonville, about 15 minutes from Gallatin and about 30 minutes from Nashville. It was an open mic night. I plugged in my guitar and sang. If I could look at those videos now, I’d cringe, because my voice has changed a lot since then. But that’s when it clicked that I could do this. For a while, I never thought about singing outside of my bedroom.”

Leon says the most important thing he has learned from his Idol journey so far is to chill out. “Even after a prerecorded episode aired, one I might have done in November but was shown in February, it was almost scarier watching it than performing it. I’ve learned to be content with the way things are.”

And what is the one thing the judges have said to him that stands out?” “Carrie called me adorable. That gave me a title bit of confidence. But they cut out the part where I said, ‘You, too.’ I was looking forward to seeing that! That was fun. And the moment that Lionel called me honest and pure, coming from one of the most honest and pure people I’ve ever met, made me feel really great.”

Asked how he would compare his actual Idol experience to date to how he thought it would be, he tells Billboard, “I knew it was going to be hard work. I wasn’t prepared for just how much work. It looks glamorous on TV but it’s not always the most glamorous. Sometimes there are really late hours and you’ve got to get that song down, but that’s what it is. It’s better than writing a paper.”

Because he’s away from school while doing Idol, the high school senior has been granted an extension to finish his paper on the history of country music, which requires a 15-page written report and a 20-minute oral presentation.

Born: Oct. 23, 1998 – Murfreesboro, Tennessee
Musical Influences: Brandy, Taylor Moore
How He Consumes Music: Apple Music, YouTube
First Idol Experience: Watching season 10 at his best friend’s house
Favorite Alums: Carrie Underwood, Scotty McCreery, Kelly Clarkson, Fantasia, Jennifer Hudson, Ruben Studdard

When Jordan McCullough was four years old, he heard his church choir sing and noticed the microphone and knew what he wanted to do with his life. “The first song I sang was ‘Falling in Love with Jesus’ and they had to have a step stool for me to stand on, because I was too short. You couldn’t see me over the banister. I was there to sing my little solo.”

Growing up, the Tennessee native heard music from the best of two worlds. “My dad introduced me to a lot of country music. George Strait and Randy Travis were staples in the house. And my mom listened to a lot of R&B groups, like SWV, Xscape and Boyz II Men.”

He continued to sing in church but there was also a demand for his vocals elsewhere. “I remember getting pulled out of middle school to sing at funerals. I probably sang at over 250 funerals in my life and I didn’t know any of the (deceased). But people would say, ‘We want the kid to come sing for my grandmother’s funeral’ and I would say, ‘Okay, I’ll be there.’”

As far as a career path, McCullough says, “I always hoped that it would be music, but I jumped into my skill set of administration, because I was insecure about chasing the dream. I knew I could do paperwork. I didn’t know if I could be a singer, but I thought it had to work out.”

This season is not McCullough’s first chance to compete on American Idol. “The opportunity presented itself a few years ago and I said no, because I didn’t think that the show wanted a singer like me, a male with a big voice. You see that a lot of times with women who have big voices and can belt it out. I never thought that translated for guys, and so I said, ‘You don’t want me,’ and I counted myself out. This year, it happened again.” Inspired by season 23’s emphasis on songs of faith, he felt more appreciated. “So I came in with a song of faith and it led me to the top 14.”

Like the other contestants, McCullough’s Idol journey began long before he was seen on television screens, with the audition process. What has he learned during his time with the show? “That I’m enough. I have a strategy and I do a lot of research when it comes to picking songs. People fell in love (with me) because I just sit there and sing, not because I was dancing, doing backflips and everything else. I can’t. I have stage presence, because I was enough. That’s the biggest thing that I’ve learned and it has given me the confidence to go forward.”

Winning the show would mean confirmation, McCullough acknowledges. “I was very insecure chasing the dream and I decided to go by faith and winning the show would mean I took the right step. Professionally it would open the door for me and my big voice, to make room in the industry for things that I don’t see, things that I don’t hear.”

Born: Sept. 16, 2001 – Frederick, Maryland
Musical Influences: Mariah Carey, Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston, Christina Aguilera, Kelly Clarkson, Jennifer Hudson, Minnie Riperton, Donna Summer
How She Consumes Music: Spotify, YouTube
First Idol Experience: “It was like the Super Bowl. It was a holiday for us to watch American Idol. I love Bo Bice (season 4). I had a poster of him in my room with his long hair.”
Favorite Alums: Fantasia, Jennifer Hudson, Carrie Underwood, Bo Bice, Jamal Roberts, Kelly Clarkson, Chris Daughtry

After telling Billboard when she started watching American Idol, Rae had a confession to make about season 7. “I voted for David Cook. And I would like to make a formal apology to David Archuleta because I do love him so much, but I did vote for David Cook and he did win.”

Rae has three early musical memories. “I couldn’t go to sleep without Evanescence’s ‘Bring Me to Life’ playing. That was my lullaby song. No Doubt’s ‘Hey Baby’ was another one. And I listened to Paula Abdul a lot and I would pretend to be her.”

At five years old, Rae became involved with musical theater, “I was Cosette in Les Miz. At our local Italian restaurant, they would always bring me up to sing ‘Castle on a Cloud.’” Rae also appeared in Chess, Showboat and A Christmas Carol. “My favorite song is ‘Nobody’s Side’ from Chess. I love to sing that.” Also at five, Rae performed live with her family. “My aunt and uncle have a big band, playing ’40s, ’50s and ’60s music for veterans.”

Although she took piano lessons, she explains, “My sister would play piano and sing, and then I would hop on the piano after and play exactly what she played and sang, so I learned a lot through that. I was gifted with perfect pitch, so I can sing. I remember notes and keys very well. I’m always able to hear a song and play it. The first song I learned to sing on piano was ‘Hey Jude.’

“My piano teacher Theresa Shykind was a big mentor in my life. She could never get me to read the music. I would always pretend to read it and I then would listen to it and play it. We were trying to do the traditional piano lesson thing and then she said, ‘You’re a songwriter.’ We wrote so many songs together and she fostered that ability.”

Like most contestants over Idol’s almost quarter-century on the air, Rae has learned a lot about herself while competing on the show. “The most important thing I’ve learned is if you think you have figured everything out, you have not. You do not know everything and there is so much more work that needs to be done, but it’s a beautiful process. I have learned about things that were below the surface that I didn’t realize were bothering me and I’m now able to deal with those things and write about them and make a plan of what I want for myself and who I am as an artist.”

Rae says many people in the past have told her about being on Idol, “You’re not there yet. You’re not ready.” She says, “But I felt ready during my audition and Luke said, ‘Why haven’t you been here sooner?’ and ‘You’re ready for this.’ I’ve always struggled with feeling like I have a purpose in the music industry, so it was a validation. That’s why I sang ‘Up to the Mountain.’ I felt like my whole life I’ve had to advocate for myself and it’s hard in the industry as a woman. So all the times that I was tired, that I didn’t want to do it, and the six shows a weekend, in that moment it made it all worth it.”

Born: Sept. 16, 1996 – Pensacola, Florida
Musical Influences: Dorinda Clark-Cole, the Clark Sisters, Mary Mary
How She Consumes Music: Apple Music, YouTube
First Idol Experience: Did not watch American Idol but when she was older, listened to Fantasia.
Favorite Alums: Fantasia, Jennifer Hudson
Who She’d Like to Duet with: Fantasia

Keyla Richardson is competing on season 24 but here is a prediction: her nine-year-old son Drew, seen on almost every episode this year mouthing the words to his mother’s songs, will be a contestant on season 30 in 2032 (save this article and see if Billboard has called it).

“Drew is a hip baby,” says Richardson. “Sometimes he’ll be in the front row playing a game and I’ll be rehearsing and he’ll stop what he’s doing to come in there and sing with me. I tell him, ‘Drew, just give me a minute.’ He listens to me all the time. He’s always with me. I’m a parent during the day, so I’ll rehearse right in front of him. ‘Hey, be quiet. Let Mommy rehearse. Let Mommy do this.’ So that’s how he knows every song.”

Drew has been hearing his mother sing since before he was born. “When he was in my belly, I was singing at worship and singing like it was my last time. So he came out knowing what it was. He loves music. He’s always moving to the groove.”

And are there clues that he would like to follow in his mother’s footsteps? “I can tell by the way he’s so into this season. He’s into every contestant, because he knows every contestant. Every contestant loves him. I can tell now his love for music has grown. Seeing me on the stage has made him want to sing more and do more. I know he’s going to be a singer. He’s always encouraging me. He always asks me if I’m okay. I know he’s definitely going to do this, because it’s so important to him. I’ll ask him, ‘Are you the contestant or is Mommy the contestant?’ When he’s on the screen, he’s like a whole different child. Drew on the camera – I don’t know where it comes from.”

Richardson also discovered music when she was very young – at age five. “I grew up singing in church. I remember singing Mary Mary’s ‘Yesterday.’” And even though she was performing at that early age, she says singing wasn’t her thing until high school. “That’s when I fell in love with it.”

She wasn’t in the school chorus, but had friends who sang. “We did a couple of videos and they went viral. People were saying I touched their hearts and was a blessing to them. That made me feel good because I love to be a blessing to other people.”

And even though she knew then she was going to be a singer, she did have another career in mind. “In high school, I thought I was going to be a crime scene investigator, like CSI.”

Richardson says she is learning a lot from being on Idol. “It teaches me my gospel roots and in the middle of this process, I’m learning how to be a different kind of artist. That’s not easy, because you come in one way and now you have to learn a way to be versatile, to reach whoever you’re trying to reach. I’ve learned to be patient and I just learned control, like controlling my emotions. I’m still working on that, but I feel like every performance is going to get better and better because I’m taking it in. I’m watching the performances like I’m watching film of football.”

Born: March 4, 2003 – Asheville, North Carolina
Musical Influences: Jason Crabb, Gaither Family, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Maroon 5, Chris Stapleton
How He Consumes Music: Spotify, AM and FM radio
First Idol Experience: Watching Carrie Underwood
Favorite Alums: Scotty McCreery, Kelly Clarkson

One of the side effects those working behind the scenes of American Idol observe every season is the bonding of the contestants, who often become friends for life. “I don’t have a lot of friends back home (in Murphy, North Carolina) because I don’t get out,” Braden Rumfelt confesses. “Being in this competition and hanging out with all the other guys and girls is crazy to me. Everybody’s great. In Hawaii my roommate was Brooks and I got to know him really well. He’s one of my favorite people on the planet. We all just have a good time. It’s a bunch of laughs and it’s fun to bounce ideas off each other and we do that very well. I know it’s a competition, but we’re all really good friends and we are learning from each other.”

Asked about his earliest memory of music, Rumfelt has a very specific answer. “It was a summer evening on a Wednesday. I was so young I couldn’t speak very well yet. I was in the back of my parents’ minivan and I remember leaning my head up against the window. I was humming something to myself and I thought, ‘I love this.’”

Rumfelt and his brother would watch their dad play guitar. “We didn’t even know what a G chord was. We would do what we saw him do. We played in church. In high school, sports was the biggest thing. I played baseball and basketball. I broke my back twice playing basketball, but baseball was my whole world until I had some leg injuries.”

Competing on Idol was a daydream. “I never thought it would be a reality because I was too afraid of being told no. I believed I was only good in my small town, where I was known for being a good singer. I don’t know what I was worried about.”

It isn’t just about a small town for Rumfelt anymore. “I was in the Atlanta airport and 20 people stopped me and asked for a picture. That was really fun. Back home, people know me and they’re coming from everywhere. I’m in Subway and some woman made a video of me. There are posters everywhere and billboards that say, ‘Vote for Braden!’ Wendy’s even put something up. And the grocery store Ingles did something. Taco Bell did too. I didn’t know it was possible for a community to get behind somebody like they’ve gotten behind me.”

The main lesson Rumfelt has learned from his time on Idol so far is to not underestimate himself “That’s not advice someone has given me. It’s what I’ve learned from being in this competition. I had a low view of myself and now I’ve got so much more to give than what I thought was possible.”

The North Carolina-born singer told Billboard what it feels like when he is performing on stage. “I love it. I’m usually not very nervous, especially at this point. A couple of nights ago, Luke Bryan said something about me being nervous. I don’t know if it’s because I wasn’t smiling, but I wasn’t nervous. I was having the time of my life. Every time I’m on stage and get to do what I do, there’s not a better feeling. Some people get an adrenaline rush when they do skydiving and things like that. Well, this is my skydiving.”

Born: April 21, 1998 – Pascagoula, Mississippi
Musical Influences: Billy Preston, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Elvis Presley, Donny Hathaway, Lalah Hathaway, Anita Baker
How He Listens to Music: Apple Music, YouTube, television
First Idol Experience: “My dad has been a fan since the beginning. I started watching with him during season 2.”
Favorite Alums: Fantasia, Taylor Hicks, Kelly Clarkson, Kolbi Jordan, Jamal Roberts, Gabby Barrett, Slater Nalley, Victor Solomon, Ruben Studdard, Clay Aiken
Who He’d Like to Duet with: Jamie Foxx

Elementary school music teacher Daniel Stallworth did a very brave thing this season on American Idol. In Hawaii, he sang “All Night Long (All Night)” in front of Lionel Richie.

“I was nervous because this song is (over 40) years old and I wanted to do it justice and I wanted to honor Lionel in the best way possible. I’m glad he enjoyed it and that I was able to get him up out of his seat. He was dancing the whole time. I wanted to jump through the crowd and grab him and get him up on stage. ‘Come sing with me!’ It’s something that will always be close to my heart.”

Of course, Stallworth started interacting with Richie from the beginning. “At my audition, Lionel said I’m a star and that my students are going to hail me as the greatest thing that ever happened to them. It made me feel special.”

Stallworth started teaching in 2021 in Mississippi and is now in his first year at River Pines Elementary School in Humble, Texas, where his students (from pre-K to fifth grade) are “amped” about his Idol journey. “They get on Instagram anytime I’m live. ‘Mr. Stallworth, this is me.’ And if I don’t say anything back to them, they say, ‘You see me talking to you!’ I’m excited that I’m able to chase my dream and they’re able to witness it.”

During his interview with Billboard, Stallworth laughed, smiled and showed his joyous personality, a contrast to his mostly serious demeanor on Idol, which the judges have mentioned more than once.

“I grew up in a traditional Baptist church and my pastor is very poised, so that’s all I’ve ever seen,” the teacher explains. “Whenever I’m getting down to business, I feel like I’m a preacher as well. But I’m a very fun and very goofy person. I’m working on (that serious side) because I want the world to see that I have a personality and I’m not this serious guy all the time. I know when to be serious. I know when to have a lot of fun. I’m working to be more approachable.”

Now 27, Stallworth was four years old when he started beating on pots and pans. “My mother took me to a music teacher and told him, ‘I want to see if he can play, because he’s making a lot of noise in the house and I’m sick of it.’”

The teacher told Stallworth’s mother that he didn’t take students younger than seven years old. “My mom said, ‘I don’t want him to take lessons. I just want to see what he can do.’” Stallworth demonstrated his musical skills and the teacher said, “When do you want to start?”

After taking lessons for a while, Stallworth was bored and told his parents he wanted to quit. “I kept playing drums in church. In the sixth grade I started in the elementary band and stayed with it through high school.” At 16, he began playing piano and joined his high school’s jazz band. Winning season 24 would mean a lot to Stallworth. “I’ve always wanted to be an inspiration to people and I know the show is American Idol, but I also want to be America’s inspiration. I want a little boy or a little girl watching TV to say, ‘I want to be like him.’ Of course, they should be themselves, but I want to be able to leave a little bit of me in each and every one of the people who are tuning in and following my journey.”

Born: August 20, 1998 – Mankato, Minnesota
Musical Influences: Chris Tomlin, MercyMe, Newsboys, Skillet, Green Day, the Lumineers, Mumford & Sons
How He Listens to Music: Vinyl, Pandora, Spotify, radio (Froggy 99.9 in Fargo, North Dakota)
First Idol Experience: Watching Jordin Sparks on Season 6
Favorite Alums: Slater Nalley, David Archuleta, Alejandro Aranda, Carrie Underwood, Canaan James Hill, Maddie Poppe, Laci Kaye Booth, Phillip Phillips, Gabby Barrett
Who He’d Like to Duet with: Lainey Wilson

Growing up in Le Sueur, Minnesota, there was always music in the Tungseth household. “My mom was a pianist and piano teacher and my dad was an opera singer who studied in Brooklyn and Aspen. My mom had a record player and a CD player and I remember going through our cupboards and finding a CD and playing it. My childhood was music. I was always singing to myself.”

Tungseth sang at weddings, in the school choir, at church and at nursing homes. He took vocal lessons but never played any gigs. “I didn’t think it was a tangible dream, especially for a kid from a small rural town. I didn’t know how dreams could happen.”

He had an entirely different career in mind, doing flooring, roofing, framing and carpentry. “After I lost my dad three years ago this May, I went to school for exercise physiology with an emphasis on sports performance. I was a strength coach. My mom has MS and I was her caretaker as well as my dad’s when he was going through treatment. I’d bring them to the gym and work with them to stretch, strengthen and condition. I wanted to work with people with disabilities or who were recovering from something. So I went back to school for that. I was looking into grad schools for physical therapy and then my sister’s best friend Esther Franklin suggested I try out for American Idol. She asked if it was OK if she signed me up and I said, ‘Sure.’ I figured 200,000 people were going to submit something, so what could come of that? Two weeks later at my brother’s wedding she checked her email and said, ‘You have an audition in Nashville in six days.’”

Since he had never gigged before, Tungseth decided if he was going to be on Idol, he needed to be in a different space. “This is an industry where you have to work super hard. You have to put yourself out there. You have to be willing to do hard things. This is so out of my comfort zone, but this is what I want to do, so you have to learn. When you’re thrown in the fire, that’s when you learn the best. That’s what this experience is for me. Last Monday, the first live show, you have cameras and you’re looking at the audience. It’s about how you hold yourself.” There’s so much I never learned before.”

The judges have already had an impact on Tungseth. “Carrie, Luke and Lionel all said there’s something about my voice that draws people in, like there’s a story in my voice. Lionel said there is a ministry and that meant a lot to me too because that’s why I’m doing this. That’s why I write songs. I haven’t written too many happy songs yet. A lot of my songs are sad songs, but they can affect people in certain ways. The judges just see that in me. Being new to this industry, I really don’t know how I’m supposed to approach things. I don’t really know what people think of me. So for them to see that in me and to encourage me to continue to draw people in, that’s been super special for me.”

Here are the interviews Billboard conducted with the three eliminated contestants on the April 6 show, before the live broadcast took place.

Season 24 of American Idol continues on Monday nights, 8-10 p.m. PT and ET through May, with contestants being eliminated each week until one finalist is crowned as the latest winner of the long-running television talent competition.

Born: Nov. 8, 2005 – Long Island, New York
Musical Influences: Ed Sheeran, Harry Styles, Jeff Buckley, Shawn Mendes
How He Listens To Music: Spotify
First Idol Experience: “I never really watched a full season of the show. I’ve seen it on social media.”
Favorite Alums: Willie Spence, Grace Kinstler, Leah Marlene, Fritz Hager, Jamal Roberts

Jesse Findling’s earliest memory of music is watching Disney movies like Lemonade Mouth with his brother and singing all of the songs. He realized how much he loved music when he was singing in first grade. And as a callback to that time, American Idol producers reunited him with his music teacher from back then for a segment filmed at his home.

In high school, the Long Island native sang in musicals like Little Shop of Horrors and Anything Goes. “Musical theater helped me grow and mature my voice. It helped me to go through Idol with confidence.”

As viewers of season 24 know, Findling has had a stutter since he was very young. “I remember getting speech therapy at school. When they filmed at my house, I also reunited with my first speech therapist and they haven’t shown that on the show yet, but it was awesome seeing her after many years, because she helped me a lot. When I was little, I thought, ‘What’s wrong with me?’ I tried to hide it. I would never raise my hand, even if I knew the answer. That made me so shy because I wouldn’t want to speak. As years went on, it got better and it got worse, but it was always something that I was shy about and even now, I’m not going to lie, it’s something I still struggle with and feel embarrassed about. But I know there are people watching who also stutter and I want to be an inspiration and show people that things like this are possible.”

Findling has already taken some of the judges’ comments to heart. “They said a few times that I’m authentic and vulnerable when I sing and that they feel every word. When I sing, that’s my goal. Every time I sing a song, I look at the lyrics and think, ‘When I’m singing this part of the song, what am I feeling and what do I want people watching to feel?’ So when the judges say things like that, I know I’m doing my job right.”

Considering all of the time he has spent on Idol so far, from his first audition to this week’s live show, he says the most important thing he has learned is to be his authentic self. “It does read through the screen. Going through this whole journey is a way for me to learn because it’s so new for me. I feel like I’ve been living in the moment and asking for advice so when the show is over, I can use that knowledge.” Findling, a biology major at Binghamton University, is getting used to being recognized during his travels home since he started on Idol. “It’s cool going shopping or being at the gym and somebody recognizes you. It’s made this journey so much easier for me, knowing that I have that support, not just from where I’m from but from my school. My family is the most supportive and they’ve been at every single round, so having them here and having that support from Long Island and Binghamton and upstate New York is really special.”

Born: Sept. 16, 2006 – El Paso, Texas
Musical Influences: Ed Sheeran, Zach Bryan, Gregory Alan Isakov
How He Consumes Music: Spotify, YouTube
First Idol Experience: “I grew up watching it but never imagined I would be on this stage.”
Favorite Alums: Phillip Phillips, Scotty McCreery, Iam Tongi

Julián Kalel is not just a finalist on American Idol. He is also a student at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif., studying psychology and philosophy. “I had to take a leave of absence. I just started my first freshman semester when Idol happened. I’m looking to go back in the fall as a freshman.”

This is not Kalel’s first time on Idol. Last season, he auditioned with his original song “Surrender,” accompanied by his sister Karyssa on violin and was awarded a Golden Ticket. “Unfortunately, there were shared concerns with American Idol and my family of my ability to balance a journey like that and my mental health. So I stepped down and I wasn’t able to continue. I’m not going to lie, there were times when I felt completely lost.”

Talking about his formative years with Billboard, Kalel explains, “When I was in high school, I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression. I thought I was very different from everyone and I socially isolated myself. I thought it completely defined me and my life for the rest of time.”

But then, the El Paso-born teenager experienced a life-changing incident. “I was in a very serious car accident. It was a head-on collision at 60 mph. I was unscathed and the person that was also involved was unscathed. And I literally took that as a blessing from God, just to see how delicate life is, how special it is, and I started living differently after that day. Up until that point, I was a really shy kid who really cared what people thought. But after that day, I thought, ‘Why do I care so much, when life can just end like that.’ I felt incredibly blessed and lucky to be alive and be uninjured. It was a miracle.”

In his childhood, Kalel was singing before he could talk. “My mom instilled the love of music in me and my sister. My dad was more into sports and baseball. I started singing my favorite Disney songs with Karyssa. We loved singing together in the living room for our parents and our family and putting together little performances. Then we started doing theater as little kids. I played Simba, Hercules, you name it. I was in Little Shop of Horrors and High School Musical. I studied the violin and I was fine at it. I just didn’t really like it. Went for the cello and got really good at it and then picked up the guitar and then the rest is history.”

Kalel says he felt a responsibility to return to Idol not to prove that he is all right, but that he belongs. “Vulnerability has a place in music; I want people not to be afraid of talking about their struggles and their pain because that’s what makes us human.”

This year, he auditioned with another original song, “Lone Guitar,” once again accompanied by Karyssa on violin. “I wrote it about being at a crossroads, deciding whether or not to go on with life.” Once again, he received three yesses from the judges, and a Golden Ticket.

At nine, Thistle took up the guitar. “A family friend had given me an old guitar when I was a toddler. It made noise and that was cool but then it collected dust. That friend’s mother got nostalgic about that guitar when I was nine and wanted it back. That was fine; I hadn’t touched it in years. But they felt so bad, they surprised me by replacing it with another guitar. I learned a couple of chords on the spot and then studied on YouTube and that’s when I knew I wanted to play music.”

Thistle had another defining moment three years later. “I’m also a huge John Hiatt fan. When I was 12, I got to play ‘Have a Little Faith’ with him at one of his shows, during the encore. It was my first time ever playing in a theater and I remember looking out at the crowd and playing John’s song with John singing. I thought, ‘I want to do this forever.’”

On the March 30 episode of Idol, the theme was songs of faith and in a full-circle moment, Thistle played “Have a Little Faith.” “It gave me faith in myself and it happened to be a faith song too, so I lucked out with that one.”

Thistle had opportunities to be on Idol during high school and his early college years. “I was on tour. I had a record coming out. It didn’t really line up. This year, I was graduating a semester early from Rutgers (with a double major in communication and journalism). I’m grateful for the timing of it because I didn’t have to take off for anything. This is my focus right now.”

Before this season of Idol, Thistle was on a European tour for the New Jersey-based Light of Day Foundation, which raises money to end Parkinson’s disease. The tour brought him to Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands and the U.K. Thistle also does a big benefit for the foundation in Asbury Park. “I bring my band. We play. We shuffle out like ants at the end of the show to sing ‘Thunder Road’ with Bruce Springsteen. It’s New Jersey and we’re shaking in our boots.”