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''The Winner's Journey'' was released on [[December 8]], [[2007]]. After five days of sales, it debuted at #12 on the [[ARIA Charts]] on [[December 17]], [[2007]], selling 11,489 copies.
''The Winner's Journey'' was released on [[December 8]], [[2007]]. After five days of sales, it debuted at #12 on the [[ARIA Charts]] on [[December 17]], [[2007]], selling 11,489 copies.


On January 2nd of 2008, Gauci began her national Winner's Journey Tour with Idol Runner-Up Matt Corby that would last over a month. The tour featured almost every track from The Winner's Journey album, excluding On My Mind and Orange Coloured Sky. Additional original material and a cover of "No One" by Alicia Keys who Gauci had cited as a major inspiration. Gauci also performed a number of original compositions, including All In My Mind (the b-side to the Here I Am single) I'm Ready, Back to Life, Secrets and Free Falling.
On January 2nd of 2008, Gauci began her national Winner's Journey Tour with Idol Runner-Up Matt Corby that would last over a month. The tour featured almost every track from The Winner's Journey album, excluding On My Mind and Orange Coloured Sky. Additional original material and a cover of "No One" by Alicia Keys who Gauci had cited as a major inspiration. Gauci also performed a number of original compositions, including All In My Mind (the b-side to the Here I Am single) I'm Ready, Back to Life, Secrets and Free Falling. The tour has been considered a major success, with positive reviews flooding in from fans on her message boards. Gauci said that the tour has been having "loads of fun on the tour and the show is everything I dreamed it would be for a first tour. It's definitely preparing me for what's to come."<ref name="Natalie MySpace blog">{{cite web|url=http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=95703413&blogID=344840757}}</ref>


=== Other performances ===
=== Other performances ===

Revision as of 01:44, 24 January 2008

Template:Infobox musical artist 2 Natalie Gauci (b. 26 November 1981, Australia) is an Australian singer of Italian and Maltese descent. She won the Network Ten music contest Australian Idol 2007,[1] at the Grand Finale at the Sydney Opera House on Sunday the 25th of November, 2007. She is the first wildcard contestant to win Australian Idol, and the fourth one from around the world, following Canada's Ryan Malcolm, Kazakhstan's Almas Kishkenbayev, and Sweden's Agnes Carlsson.

Biography

Early Life

Before Idol, Gauci was a session musician who performed with a few artists including Matt Hetherington and Beven Addinsal. After performing at various venues, she began songwriting and creating her first record, releasing a solo EP on April 2006 titled Take It or Leave It. The EP scored at the Top 500 in the Billboard World Songwriting Contest in 2007. On November 2006, Gauci was invited to Los Angeles as part of the "Oz City Song Circle", where she performed with other Australian artists to the American audience.[2]

At around the end of 2006 into 2007, she formed "The Natalie Gauci Band" which featured herself on vocals and keyboard, Kumar Shome on electric and acoustic guitar, Jules Pascoe on electric and double bass and Conrad Tracey on drums and percussion. The band took a soul, pop and jazz style, and have performed at several venues around Melbourne.[2]

Gauci was also a music teacher at the Academy of Mary Immaculate, Fitzroy. She was one of several vocal coaches who offered private tuition to those seeking it at the Catholic all-girls school.

Australian Idol 2007

Gauci auditioned in Melbourne, Victoria singing one of her original songs and also "I Will Survive" because the judges requested her to perform a cover track. Judges Ian Dickson and Mark Holden both commented that they thought that Natalie could win the competition, though Marcia Hines warned Natalie that she still had to work hard, as such a comment had always been 'the kiss of death' for contestants in the past. She was chosen by the judges to enter the top 24, but during her semi- final round, she did not gain enough votes to proceed to the Top 12. The two finalists who progressed through in her semi-final were Tarisai Vushe and Lana Krost. She was then called back to perform at the Wildcard Show and once again was not voted by the public into the Top 12, hence the judges chose her and Carl Riseley as the judges choice to be included in the Top 12.

During the Top 12 performances, she received three of Mark Holden's coveted "touchdowns". Her first after her spectacular rendition of Rihanna's song "Umbrella". She later received two more touchdowns in consecutive weeks, one for "Boys in Town" by Divinyls and the last for "How High the Moon" from Ella Fitzgerald.

On 12 November, she was the first to be announced into the Final 2, later joined by Matt Corby, making her the third Australian Idol wildcard contestant to make it to the Finale. Season 2's Anthony Callea was the first wildcard to make it to the Finale, but lost to Casey Donovan. Season 3's Emily Williams was the second wildcard to make it to the Finale, but lost to Kate DeAraugo.

She recorded the winner's single, "Here I Am" along with Matt Corby at Kings Cross studio in Sydney, and performed the song at the Grand Finale after being announced the winner of the competition. The single was released on November 28, 2007. She is the first wildcard contestant to win Australian Idol.

Natalie released the winner's single the day following the Finale. It debuted on the charts at #2 behind Timbaland.

In an interview a few days after the Australian Idol Finale, Natalie explained that she was not expecting to win the competition. She believed that Matt Corby was far too popular with the teenage girls for her to win over him.

Natalie was known to significantly alter songs when covering them, such as Rihanna's Umbrella, Michael Jacksons Man In The Mirror and even on the winner's single "Here I Am". This is one of the many reasons Gauci became so popular. Her rearrangements of popular songs allowed her to demonstrate her artistic flare.

Australian Idol Performances

Week Theme Song choice Original artist Result
Top 24 Contestant's Choice "Hurt" Christina Aguilera Selected as Wildcard Finalist
Wildcard Contestant's Choice "Feeling Good" Nina Simone Selected as Top 12 Finalist
Top 12 Contestant's Choice "(Baby I've Got You) On My Mind" Powderfinger Safe
Top 11 Rock "Sweet Child o' Mine" Guns N' Roses Safe
Top 10 Disco "I Will Survive" Gloria Gaynor Safe
Top 9 Acoustic "Man in the Mirror" Michael Jackson Safe
Top 8 Brit pop "Rehab" Amy Winehouse Safe
Top 7 Year you were born "Endless Love" Lionel Richie/Diana Ross Safe
Top 6 Judge's Choice - Hines
Contestant's Choice
"Nothing Compares 2 U"
"Umbrella"
Sinéad O'Connor
Rihanna
Safe
Top 5 Australian Made "Boys in Town" Divinyls Btm 2
Top 4 Big Band
Big Band
"Orange Colored Sky"
"How High the Moon"
Nat King Cole
Ella Fitzgerald
Safe
Top 3 Audience Choice
Contestant's Choice
"Ray of Light"
"Nobody Knows"
Madonna
Pink
Safe
Top 2 Contestant's Choice
Contestant's Choice
Winner's Single
Grand Final performance
"Apologize"
"Running Up That Hill"
"Here I Am"
"Man in the Mirror"
OneRepublic
Kate Bush
Natalie Gauci
Michael Jackson
WINNER

Post-Idol Career

2007-2008: The Winner's Journey

As the winner of the fifth series of Australian Idol, Natalie went straight to the Sony BMG Studios to record her debut album The Winner's Journey. The album is a collection of most of her performances from Australian Idol that were re-recorded to go with a two disc (CD/DVD) pack that included a 35 minute interview.

The first single from the album was "Here I Am", the winner's single and in its first week on the ARIA Charts it debuted at #2, behind "Apologize" by Timbaland featuring OneRepublic. It was the first debut single from an Idol winner that did not reach #1 in its first week, although it did debut at #1 on the official Physical Singles Sales chart.

The Winner's Journey was released on December 8, 2007. After five days of sales, it debuted at #12 on the ARIA Charts on December 17, 2007, selling 11,489 copies.

On January 2nd of 2008, Gauci began her national Winner's Journey Tour with Idol Runner-Up Matt Corby that would last over a month. The tour featured almost every track from The Winner's Journey album, excluding On My Mind and Orange Coloured Sky. Additional original material and a cover of "No One" by Alicia Keys who Gauci had cited as a major inspiration. Gauci also performed a number of original compositions, including All In My Mind (the b-side to the Here I Am single) I'm Ready, Back to Life, Secrets and Free Falling. The tour has been considered a major success, with positive reviews flooding in from fans on her message boards. Gauci said that the tour has been having "loads of fun on the tour and the show is everything I dreamed it would be for a first tour. It's definitely preparing me for what's to come."[3]

Other performances

Gauci performed at the annual televised event Carols by Candlelight in Melbourne on Christmas Eve 2007. She performed "The First Noel" and "All I Want For Christmas Is You". The show was broadcast by the Nine Network and Natalie joined other Idol hot favourates such as Guy Sebastian, Paulini, Anthony Callea and Jessica Mauboy who had all previously performed on the show in the past. Performing on Carols by Candlelight is classed as a huge achievement.

She also was a key performer at the Sydney New Years Eve 2007 Spectacular that was broadcast by Network Ten.

Mid-way through the Winner's Journey tour, Gauci also made an appearance at Star City, Sydney at the 'Hits and Stars' party. Gauci will immediately fly out of Perth on January 24th after a performance at the Burswood theatre as she will be performing at the final night of the Malta Song for Europe festival on January 26. After the deal was finalised Natalie screaming with joy, telling timesofmalta.com, 'this is such fantastic news. I can't wait to be there.'

Discography

Natalie Gauci discography
Studio albums1
Video albums1
Music videos1
Singles1
B-sides1
Tours1


The following is an incomplete discography of every album and single released by Australian pop/jazz/soul music artist Natalie Gauci. Prior to being on Australian Idol, Natalie Gauci, with her band, released an EP named 'Take it or Leave it'.

Albums

Statistics Singles
The Winner's Journey
  • Released: December 8 2007
  • Chart positions: #11 Australia [4]
  • Australian sales: 70,000
  • ARIA certification: Platinum [5]

Singles

Year Song ARIA Charts Certification Sales Album
2007 "Here I Am" 2 Gold (35,000) 19,254 The Winner's Journey

External links

References

  1. ^ "Carl kicked out, Idol down to two". Retrieved November 12. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
  2. ^ a b The Natalie Gauci Band. Retrieved on November 21, 2007.
  3. ^ http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=95703413&blogID=344840757. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  4. ^ [http://www.ariacharts.com.au/pages/charts_display.asp?chart=1A50. Retrieved December 23 2007.
  5. ^ "ARIA Charts - Accreditations - 2007 Albums". ARIA. Retrieved July 3 2007.
Preceded by Australian Idol
Winner

Season 5 (2007)
Succeeded by
Incumbent