By CASEY NEILL
MADDISON McNamara is swapping the factory floor for the stage.
The 21-year-old from Officer appeared on Channel 9 television show The Voice on Sunday 1 May.
She’s worked at her dad’s Dandenong South timber finishing business, Top Quality Finish, since 2011.
It pays the bills, Maddison said, but she’s ready to ditch the sander and cleaning products to pick up a microphone.
“Going from smelling fumes to not smelling fumes is amazing,” she said.
“Once you finally get to do what you want to do it makes it that much more rewarding.”
Maddison belted out an emotion-packed rendition of Gone by Lianne La Havas for her blind audition.
She takes the stage with the judges – the Madden Brothers, Jessie J, Delta Goodrem and Ronan Keating – sitting in large red chairs with their backs to her.
“At the start I was just freaking out because it was halfway through my audition and no-one’s turned yet,” she said.
The Madden Brothers were the first to turn around after she sufficiently wowed them with her soulful vocals.
“My instant reaction then was ‘I’m through, I don’t care what happens now, I’m happy’,” she said.
The other judges followed suit.
“To get four chairs was just the best feeling ever,” she said.
She chose to join the Madden Brothers’ team so will receive coaching from the pair throughout her time in the competition.
“When they turned around I felt an instant connection with them,” she said.
Maddison had been practicing Gone for the past 18 months.
“My singing teacher from my university actually showed me the song and it took me a while to actually listen to it, but once I did I fell in love with it,” she said.
“I connect to the song and I sing it well so I thought ‘why not do that?’.”
She was studying a bachelor of music at the Australian Institute of Music in Melbourne but has put it on hold to complete an advanced diploma for now.
“I definitely want to take it onto the big stage. I want to be a recording artist and I definitely want to be an influence to children and to other singers who want to live the dream,” she said.
“A couple of years ago I did a trip to Cambodia for Schoolies – but it’s called Coolies, because you go there to volunteer for people who have no family.
“We did a lot of English, maths and music.
“Once I experienced that and saw how kids at that age have no families and they have no money and they don’t have education, seeing that made me really want to be around those children and really teach that age.
“You can get drunk any night of the week, I think. Why not take an experience?”
Maddison hopes The Voice will provide her with the exposure she needs to turn her passion into a career.
“I’ve just been performing my whole life, since the age of five,” she said.
“Once my parents split up I was really focused on my music.
“Before they split up I was focussed on it because I thought I had to be.
“I started doing it for myself. At age 14 I thought ‘this is it’.”
The show’s battle rounds are next, where Maddison will belt out a song against a team mate to keep her place, and live performances will follow.
“The thought of thousands and thousands of people is daunting, but this is what you want to do for the rest of your life, you have to get used to it,” she said.
