After 10 years of kicking around the music business — and being kicked down by it — 27-year-old Danyl Johnson admits he had given up his hopes for stardom. But then students at an arts school in Reading, England, gave their teacher a morale boost.
Drama and dance instructor Johnson now carries the heady title of “the next Susan Boyle” after wowing the judges — including the notoriously hard-to-please Simon Cowell — when he performed in the opening round of a British forebear to “American Idol,” “The X Factor.” Appearing in his first U.S. TV interview, the man with a million-dollar smile and voice to match told TODAY’s Matt Lauer and Ann Curry Thursday he’s still processing his sudden fame — and revealed how his students gave him the push to make one last grab at the brass ring.
“I’ve been singing for about 10 years now, and I didn’t really get much interest,” Johnson said live via satellite from London. “I thought that dream had gone past.
“The kids have been so supportive and they said I should go into the competition. I just thought, ‘OK, I’ll send an application, and if I hear back I will see what happens from there.’ I’m so glad they got me to do it now, I have to say.”
Overnight sensation
Johnson is now a household name in music circles, even though he’s just one show into his reality TV competition run. Performing the Beatles classic “With a Little Help From My Friends,” the teacher showed a veteran’s performing chops and a voice that got Cowell to give him what may have been the first standing ovation in all of his various TV judging duties in England and the U.S.
