‘American Idol’ to feature Alabama worship leader’s audition

After a season premiere in which one Alabama singer got a standing ovation from Lionel Richie, Sunday’s follow-up episode will feature another Alabama audition.

The show’s producers have confirmed that 22-year-old Springville native Isaiah Moore will be featured on the episode airing at 7 p.m. March 16 on ABC.

According to information provided by Gadsden State Community College, Moore is a former Gadsden State student who started out singing along to the radio during car rides with his grandmother, then learned trumpet, guitar and piano starting in middle school. After being impressed by the Gadsden State Show Band when it visited his high school, he won a trumpet scholarship to the community college.

After struggling with online studies during the COVID-19 pandemic, he rebounded to win another scholarship and went on to perform with the school’s A Cappella Choir, the Gadsden State Singers and the Show Band. According to information provided by Gadsden State, he is “currently taking a break from coursework to focus on ‘American Idol’ and his full-time job as the worship leader at Redeemer Community Church,” but plans to complete an associate degree.

Moore began his ‘Idol’ voyage with a virtual audition on Aug. 23, his 22nd birthday, at the urging of his then-fiancée, Abby Grace Burke.

According to Gadsden State, his selections in that first virtual audition included Luke Combs’ “Where the Wild Things Are” as well as “Wanna Be Loved” by the Red Clay Strays, an Alabama roots-rock group that broke out to national notice in 2024. In a follow-up, he sang “Greater Still” by Brandon Lake.

Between that eventful day and the Nashville audition that will be shown on Sunday, he and Burke married on Oct. 26. They had to cancel their honeymoon cruise to attend the live audition in early November; Abby Grace Moore later posted that they’d honeymooned in Gatlinburg instead.

“On Nov. 4, we made it inside the hotel at 9 a.m. and my audition time didn’t happen until 9 p.m that night,” he said. “I was the second to last person to audition that day.”

“I blacked out the first half of the audition but towards the end, I gained some confidence,” he said in the Gadsden State news release. “It helped when I realized that the judges really care about you; they cared about what I was saying to them. They are so down to earth. All of the judges were wonderful to me.”

“There are parts of the audition experience that I don’t remember so I’m excited to see how it all played out,” he said.

The March 9 premiere featured 17-year-old Crews Wright of Samson, Ala. Wright won his Golden Ticket to Hollywood after singing a duet with Bryan. Richie told him, “You’re gonna go places, son.”