Fort Worth singer gets her shot on ‘The Voice’

March 13,2017

By Rick Press

Fort Worth area artists have definitely made their mark on TV singing competitions -- from the original ‘American Idol’ Kelly Clarkson in 2002 to Luke Wade and Reagan James on ‘The Voice’ in 2014. And there have been many in between.

On Monday night, Fort Worth native Andrea Thomas took her shot at stardom when she performed during “the blind auditions” of “The Voice,” the popular NBC show.

Actually, for some reason, producers only showed a snippet of Thomas’ performance of “Baby, Now That I’ve Found You,” a song first recorded in 1967 by The Foundations but later covered by country/folk artist Alison Krauss. Thomas’ sweet rendition of the song got coach Blake Shelton to turn his chair, and she is now officially a member of Team Blake.

But viewers didn’t get to see Thomas’ full blind audition or the pre-song profile.

So we’ll fill in some of the details and fix that.

Thomas, who graduated from the same high school as Clarkson (Burleson High School), is no stranger to performing. She spent two years as a backup singer for country superstar Carrie Underwood and has also done some acting. According to a bio, she got her start performing in her parents’ ministry at age 4, singing for the homeless on the streets of downtown Fort Worth.

Her grandfather, Jimmy Jones, was inducted into the Country Gospel Music Hall of Fame in 1999, according to her Voice bio.

Like many Texas singers who span several genres -- Thomas considers herself a country soul/pop artist -- she has moved to Nashville, but much of her family still lives in the Fort Worth area. She faces a tough road ahead, as Shelton’s team is chock full of female singers (eight out of 10) with country roots. The blind auditions will be completed this week, and the Battle Round begins next week. Thomas will duet with one of her Team Blake members, and only one of them will advance.