Castletownroche girl, Shannon Murphy sailed through the first live voting show in the RTE singing contest ‘The Voice’ at the weekend. Shannon’s performance won her the highest number of votes of the night from the judges and, even more importantly, the highest public vote.

Coach Bressie chose the American folk rock band The Lumineer’s song ‘Ho Hey’ for Shannon and it proved a good choice, nicely showcasing her vocal range and tone. She scored eight points each from judges Jamelia, Kian Egan and Sharon Corr and a nine from Bressie, putting her straight to the top of the judges’ votes.

DIFFICULT WAIT

Shannon, who’d been excited all week about performing live in Sunday night’s show, confessed to being less confident when it came time to go on stage. “I was sick with nerves” she told The Avondhu this week.

She also said that having to wait the hour in between the performance part of the show ending and the announcement of the winners of the public vote, was nerve-wracking. “But the others were in the same position, it was as bad for them,” she pointed out.

Shannon must now wait for word on when she’ll next perform on the popular RTE show. Next Sunday night will feature the first outing at the live public voting shows for the remainder of the contestants, including Fermoy singer Kelly Mongan. Shannon will be told after Sunday night’s show whether she’ll be competing again the following Easter Sunday night or whether it’ll be Sunday, April 7th. Meanwhile she’s been getting “brilliant support” locally, she says and was even approached for autographs at the weekend.