Alex Lambert
Cast bio for 19 Entertainment’s web series If I Can Dream
With his electrifying, soulful voice and humble demeanor, Alex Lambert charmed millions of viewers on the current season of American Idol with his rendition of Ray Lamontagne’s “Trouble.” Though it didn’t save him from elimination, a viewer-created online petition calling for Alex’s reinstatement, signed by more than 20,000 fans, impressed If I Can Dream/American Idol executive producer Simon Fuller, who decided to give the fresh-faced 19-year-old Texan a second chance to fulfill his dream of becoming an artist by inviting him to participate in If I Can Dream.
The luxurious Dream House in the Hollywood Hills is a far cry from the one-bedroom apartment Alex was sharing with his mom and three brothers before appearing on Idol. “I usually slept on the floor, or I’d go stay the night with a friend any chance I got,” he says. When he wasn’t working selling security systems door-to-door, or toiling at Sonic, Alex would hang out in his grandmother’s old station wagon to practice his singing and guitar playing without disturbing his family. “That’s where I wrote my music,” he says. “It’s the only place I could really get any privacy.”
Alex taught himself to play guitar at age eight, which wasn’t surprising to his family given that both of his grandfathers are guitarists. His mom’s father was also a producer and performed in a band with country legend Conway Twitty. Alex’s father also plays guitar and his mother sings, so music was a constant in the Lambert household. Alex grew up listening to country and blues and cites blues great Stevie Ray Vaughan as one of his main inspirations. During his sophomore year in high school, he began writing songs. “I write a lot of songs about love, but I also write about my upbringing,” Lambert says. “My mom works really long hours to support us, so my brothers and I have kind of raised ourselves.”
It was Alex’s mother Gwen who convinced him to audition for Idol. “She’d been after me since I was 16,” Alex says. “This year she told me if I didn’t audition, she was going to take away my cell phone.” Alex had never performed in public before he auditioned for the judges, and had only performed twice, to a handful of people at a couple of local coffeehouses, before appearing live on Idol’s big stage. When he was eliminated before making the Top 12, Alex was crushed. “I really thought that was the end of my dream,” he says.
Now that he’s been given another chance to pursue his career, Alex is hoping that joining the other aspiring artists on If I Can Dream will enable him to hone his vocal, songwriting, and performance skills, record a demo, and perhaps land a record deal. “My dream is to write amazing songs that people can connect with,” Alex says, “and then to hit the road and perform them. That’s what I’ve wanted to do my entire life, to play music non-stop, so I’m grateful to be given this opportunity.”
(March 2010)
