For those of you who watched and voted in our talent competition we called “Today’s Superstar,” you may remember Kristy Starling. Back in November she was the runner up in the contest and has gone on to launch a singing career. For months our cameras were given full access and we followed her through the entire process. “Today” host Matt Lauer reports.
Kristy Starling says she had a feeling she wasn’t going to become “Today’s Superstar.”
“It was kind of like, ‘okay it’s all over with now,’” says Starling.
But she couldn’t have been more wrong. Just days after losing the competition Kristy got a call from Grammy award winning producer David Foster. He wanted her to come out to his Malibu studio to record a demo. “It wasn’t until I got into the studio with her that I really realized really, really how great she is. She truly has what it takes to be a star.”
Foster sent the demo to Barry Landis, president of the Christian music division at Warner Bros. Records. Landis liked what he heard.
“I thought maybe that it might be the kind of music that would work for the label. So we made a call, reached out and asked her to come to Nashville to meet us.”
Landis made Kristy an offer she couldn’t refuse. A record deal she signed live on “Today.”
The ink on the contract wasn’t dry before Kristy was caught in the whirlwind of recording her first CD.
Landis says, “We’re going to have studios lined up and players lined up, producers lined up… and I hope that by about the second or third week in April that we’d have a record in the streets for people.”
So with just six weeks to get her CD completed Kristy had to hit the ground running.
There were the hair appointments, shopping sprees, photo shoots for the CD cover, several meetings with record company executives and of course… recording the music.
Starling says, “I just pray everyday, lord please let my voice last.”
Singer and music producer, Richard Marx was brought in to help. “Somebody like Kristy is willing to roll up her sleeves and get in there and dare to be great.
Kristy Starling’s dream of becoming a recording artist has now come true. She says, “Ever since I was a little girl I’ve wanted to sing contemporary Christian music. The “Today” show has been so amazing to me. They have made all of this stuff happen.”