Samohi ‘idol’ will perform at entertainment industry party
By Daily Press staff
Look out, William Hung.
Judges at Santa Monica High School will pick the next “Samohi Idol” this evening from among 10 finalists.
Modeled after the popular television program “American Idol,” the Samohi Idol competition is down to final finalists. Those performers will take the stage in Barnum Hall this evening at 7 p.m. Tickets cost $10, with proceeds benefiting the class of 2004.
A panel of three judges — a Samohi advisor and two teachers — will then narrow down the field to three. A winner will be picked by the audience, and sent to sing at a Fox Studios industry party this summer, said Dana Danesi, an English teacher overseeing the competition.
“It’s been really fun,” Danesi said. “They did it last year for the first time and it went really well, it was a huge success.”
A total of 25 Samohi students auditioned to become the school’s second idol. The finalists include Levi Booker, Jessie Clemens, Rachael Gross, Kyndacee Harris, Ari Holland, Salomae Kpohanu, Mai Anh Perches, Raquel Rodriguez, Paulina Sekulski and Maytal Warshaw, said Simon Hanna, a representative for the class of 2004.
Holland, 16, a sophomore, plans to sing “Journey to the Past” from the film “Anastasia.” If she’s picked by judges as one of the final three, she said she’ll sing Shania Twain’s “Man, I Feel Like A Woman.”
“I love to sing, it’s just something that I’m really good at — or that’s what my friends tell me,” said Holland, who hopes to study performing arts at NYU after high school. “It sounded like something to do and I said, ‘That’s cool’ — but I didn’t really know about the end prize, so I was like, ‘Cool’... I try to do as much involved with singing as I can.”
— John Wood
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 30, 2004. Read the original PDF.