The American Idol 2014 Top 15 girls took the stage tonight, but only 10 of them actually performed for your votes in the semifinals. Five of the ladies will be sent home by American Idol judges Keith Urban, Harry Connick Jr., and Jennifer Lopez without ever getting to face the public vote.
Our live American Idol recap tonight is sure to be full of plenty of drama when the Top 15 female contestants are suddenly slashed down to just 10 girls left in the competition. We’ve already made our predictions about who will be eliminated by the judges tonight, now we just have to wait and see how it all goes down.
In case you need a refresher of the American Idol 2014 Top 15 girls still in the competition, here’s who will be facing the chopping block tonight:
Austin Wolfe, Brandy Neelly, Briana Oakley, Bria Anai Johnson, Emily Piriz, Jillian Jensen, Kristen O’Connor, Andrina Brogden, MK Nobilette, Jena Ascuitto, Jess Meuse, Kenzie Hall, Majesty Rose York, Malaya Watson, and Marrialle Sellars.
Who will be the ones who got eliminated on American Idol by the judges tonight? Which 10 ladies will you get to vote for to move on to the Top 13? Read on for our recap!
And here we go! We start off tonight with a refresher on the Top 15 girls. One of these ladies could be your next American Idol. But only ten of them will actually get to perform for America’s votes tonight. Five of the girls will be sent home. The judges will only call up the ten they want to have the chance to move on to the Top 13. The rest will be eliminated.
To help prepare the contestants for the competition and their future in the music industry, American Idol 2014 has brought back former judge Randy Jackson to mentor the singers. He says he wanted to give the contestants the best advantage they could get to win this competition by helping them to grow from their critiques and helping the judges find the next superstar.
In Randy Jackson’s Boot Camp, the contestants are given lots of help from vocal coaches and others, including — interestingly — a set of spiritual advisors! They also get love from former American Idol finalists Chris Daughtry and Adam Lambert.
Now finally we move on to the performances!
The first singer up tonight is Majesty Rose York, who auditioned in Atlanta. She starts off maybe a tiny bit slow for just a few words, but then she just explodes out with personality and awesome vocals. She’s on fire! We have virtually no doubt at all that Majesty York will be in the Top 13 girls!
Majesty Rose sings “Happy” by Pharrell
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Up next is someone the American Idol judges thought early on could have the whole package, nurse Kristen O’Connor. We’re a bit surprised that she was picked by the judges. We thought she would be one of the five eliminated tonight. She must have been great in boot camp! Sadly, we can’t say the same about her performance tonight. It’s frankly terrible and we feel like the judges wasted a spot they could have given someone else.
Kristen O’Connor sings “Turning Tables” by Adele
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Keith Urban says the next girl up tonight is from San Francisco and had a lot of fire and passion in her audition — Briana Oakley! She takes a few moments to warm up to the song, but ends up blowing it out toward the end. She drops the last note a tiny bit, but overall it is a terrific performance. We think she totally deserves to go to Top 13.
Briana Oakley sings “Warrior” by Demi Lovato
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Now we have Jena Ascuitto, who pronounces her name like ‘Gina’ for those who hadn’t hear that by now. We’ve really liked Jena from the beginning and it’s great to see her in the Top 10 girls. However, we feel the performance is a little rough and strained in places. She kills it at the end, but we don’t think it is her best performance. Jennifer Lopez calls her “kind of a badass” and we agree.
Jena Ascuitto sings “Paint It Black” by The Rolling Stones
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Next up the judges have decided they want to hear Bria Anai Johnson (or ‘Lips’ as she’s been nicknamed) from Atlanta. Another surprise pick to us, as we probably would not have chosen her based on her previous performances. We’re not loving this one either as it sounds pitchy and oversung to us. She sounded like she was off the music in places as well.
Bria Anai Johnson sings “Wrong Side Of A Love Song” by Melanie Fiona
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Keith Urban says the next contestant walked into her audition looking like a star. Now singing for your votes is Marrialle Sellars! Or, as we know her, the girl with more screen time than any other singer this season so far that reminds us too much of Miley Cyrus. Sadly, she is just terrible in our opinion. It’s like she’s just talking through the song, not even singing. It’s bad karaoke. We regret she got this spot and not another girl.
Marrialle Sellars sings “Roar” by Katy Perry
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We’ve been waiting for her all night, the girl we have nicknamed “Pinky” in our Idol Chat Room — Jessica Meuse! J-Lo introduced her as a “real original” and we agree. This just might be the best performance of the night, although we don’t really love the song choice. We think “Pinky” deserves the votes to go through to the Top 13. We do hope, however, that she goes back to rock and steers away from the country a bit.
Jess Meuse sings “Drink a Beer” by Luke Bryan
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Just three more ladies to go tonight and the rest who are not chosen will be eliminated. Next up is Emily Piriz, another girl we didn’t think would get through tonight. She was great in Hollywood Week, but she just seems to be a bit flat in personality, even though she has a lovely voice. The performance is technically good, but it just doesn’t hit us in the gut.
Emily Piriz sings “Paris (Ooh La La)” by Grace Potter
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We would like to believe the judges’ next pick is all about her fantastic voice, but we think a lot of viewers are going to believe it is about the ‘gay’ thing. Up next is MK Nobilette, who is indeed a lesbian, but also happens to have a great voice. While we don’t think she had the best performance of the night, we certainly think she is in the top five of the evening considering the big failures of some of the earlier girls.
MK Nobilette sings “All of Me” by John Legend
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It’s time for our very last choice from the American Idol judges for the 2014 Top 10 girls. Six ladies left and only one spot. Who will they choose? The final spot goes to…
Before we find out, we break for commercial and then find out which of the two guys America voted between will go to the Top 15 guys for tomorrow night. In the battle between Neco Starr and Ben Briley, the winner is… as we predicted… Ben!
Now, back to our final girl of the evening and the judges have chosen — and we just keep getting surprised tonight — Malaya Watson! We are shocked over who has been left sitting in the back and will be eliminated, but Malaya does give a very strong performance. We feel she oversung it a bit, but it is certainly one of the best of the night once she gets over a few rough spots in the beginning.
Malaya Watson sings “Hard Times” by Ray Charles
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So that means the ladies who have been eliminated tonight are: Brandy Neelly, Andrina Brogden, Austin Wolfe, Jillian Jensen, and Kenzie Hall.
Do you agree with who the judges eliminated tonight? Which girls will you be voting for to move on to the Top 13?
I feel that the girls are all week silly singers this year and need more time to grow ! The songs that they have to choose from are not versatile!! Just a bad pick of girls! A guy will stand out this year but the producers need help with song selections! And whats up with this only ten preform! CORNY Now!!!!!!!! Use to love the show!!!!!!!
I agree!!!! I love Harry and Keith but the girls are weak singers don’t think they are taking it seriously!!!!!
I know a guy will win their voices are stronger!
No. They should’ve had Brandy, Jillian, and Austin performing. Not Bria Anai, Kristen, and Marrialle who, by the way, sucked. The judges were just picking her looks against her voice. My Top 5 is Majesty, Briana, Jena, Jessica, and Malaya. Wildcards are MK and Emily.
Your right!!!!
I never thought the girls would be worse than last year’s batch — but these were much worse
Candice was one out of a few that was very natural and confident!!!!! Love her single Cry!!!!
Last years winner was great! Her new single well done!! Hear it! It’s called Cry
I’m still hoping to hear something from Kree. So far it doesn’t look like anyone has picked her up yet.
Yes I agree i loved Kree waiting on it bad!!!
Idol should be embarrassed most of the girls were awful. Marielle is literally uncomfortable and painful to watch. You’ve got to be kidding me with her. Jesse, ugh! M.K. will lose power and gets the gay sympathy vote. Get some girls that will sell freakin songs. Who will buy any of these girls music except MAYBE Jena… maybe. Get real idol.
Some bad performances tonight. Glad Harry got on that girl for her song choice. These young girls r role models-like it or not-to young tween watchers. That song was wrong for her. Time for 17-18 yr olds to act w class and stop trying shock value(Miley) for attention.
Better girls were left out. Not fair to them or fans for not getting to vote for them.
I have to wonder about the advice and mentoring they were given…? I also thought Austin and Brandy (and really the others too) deserved to be heard and considered by the public. I am more convinced that the American Idol will be a guy this year.
How is Kenzie not in? Over thousands of people have said that Kenzie would be the one to beat and that she would win the whole thing. Even Austin is amazing and she can’t be eliminated already when she hasn’t performed yet. Kinda odd and unfair though.
This was horrible! What a disappointment. I was so excited to watch this year because the judges actually get along and are enjoyable to watch. I don’t like their choice for top 10 at all though, and then to have 15 on there and not even let 5 of them sing. Lame. The girls who did sing were mostly boring and I didn’t connect to them at all except Jena. I was dying to see Kenzie sing – she is interesting to watch and fun, but she didn’t even get to perform. Also wanted to see Austin. I was ready for this season and thinking it was going to be great, but this was awful. I guess I’ll watch tomorrow to see if they decide to leave some good, interesting singers in for the boys. If not, I’m done. SO.VERY.ANNOYED.
Yeah this was what you call “a bitch move” by Idol. How much you wanna bet that this pisses off the viewers, and they all jump ship to The Voice on NBC next week?
Loved Majesty, MK and Malaya. Those three are the stand outs so far, but we’ll know for sure once they have a few more performances under their belts. Thinking MK was my favorite of the three, though. Beautiful voice with such simple emotion and gravitas. Not an easy feat.
I am disgusted by the way Idol handled this. They exploited those
girls, and humiliated them on national television. Don’t tell 15 girls that they get the chance to perform for America’s vote, only to lie to them and say “nope, not you five.”
I am devastated for those girls. You know that all of their families
and friends were home, all crowded around one TV watching Idol waiting
their girl to sing. And they never even got the chance to.
For some reason, I thought Idol had grown past this, and was going to
be a more positive show this season. Boy was I WRONG! Don’t lie to the
contestants promising that they get to sing, and then take away their
chance. This is the type of sh*t that will make viewers jump ship to The
Voice next week.
This is by far the second worst thing Idol has ever done. (Hiring Nicki Minaj is the first.)
I really enjoyed Nicki 🙂 But I agree with everything else.
No one else did. Idol had the lowest ratings in its show’s history last year.
I think that Briana is good, but needed to add emotion. I could see Majesty and Jena selling records, Malaya has room to grow, and MK is mediocre, but can at least connect. Emily needed a better song choice instead of doing the same song again. Jessica Meuse was a favorite of mine, but she could have showcased herself better. They also should have kept Kenzie, Austin, and Jillian over Marialle, Bria, and Kristen. I think the girls seemed weak because they had more nerves than previous seasons where they knew they would perform instead of anticipating if they were chosen by the judges.
Where’s your picture and highlight of Emily? She was awesome!!
Thanks, Keith and Harry for focusing on the importance of the lyrics. And Harry, you couldn’t have phrased it better. Speak the words, and let’s all listen to what you’re really singing about. Emily knew it was a vocal twerk and she did it anyway. Sad to hear such talent thrown in the trash.
I was expecting everyone to be called and sing in front of everyone. How come those 5 were not called. What’s worse is that they let singers who are not that good. I would have picked Brandy, Kenzie, and Austin over Jessica, MK and Kristen
AUSTIN, KENZIE, ANDRINA AND BRANDY ARE BY FAR MUCH MORE SUPERIOR THAN MOST OF THE CONTESTANTS IN THE TOP 10. WHAT ON EARTH IS HAPPENING TO IDOL? THEY JUST KILLED THEIR CHANCES OF GETTING BETTER RATINGS.
Heavy sigh. Why can’t they come up with a format and stick to it…like the one they used at the beginning?
I feel robbed and know it’s only a fraction of how the ones left behind feel. 2 of my 3 faves were cut from the girls..didn’t bother watching the boys. Don’t get it, don’t like it, don’t know what I’ll do about it.
Do know I’ll be watching The Voice where every contestant gets to perform before getting cut.