The end of the singing competition was a relief for American Idol runner-up David Archuleta, who says he’s ready to move on with the next part of his life.
After having spent more than four months tied to the show with schedules so hectic the competitors barely had any free time to themselves, being able to go home was a welcoming feeling.
“As the weeks went on, we had more songs … to have to learn along with other things. With (the) final week, it was the busiest of all,” says Archuleta. “It was hard to find time to even rehearse and stuff along with school and everything else going on — the competition is all over and now it’s time to really focus on music.”
Archuleta, who is in his junior year in high school, intends to continue his education while he works on his music. Music is his passion, but Archuleta has always made his education his priority.
The fear of his music career going nowhere and leaving him without anything to fall back on only strengthens Archuleta’s wanting to ensure he has other career options.
“I think school’s really important. It was my main priority before this because I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to get anywhere with music,” says Archuleta, 17, from Murray, Utah. “Even if music does turn out to go somewhere for me, you never know how long it’ll last.”
As for all the media buzz surrounding the criticism of his “stage father,” Archuleta says he hadn’t heard much of what was being said until later on. “(My dad) understood that I didn’t like to hear anything going on in the news about me good or bad, just because I didn’t want it to distract me or let it go to my head or anything like that,” he says. “I just wanted to stay myself and how I was at the beginning of the competition before all this happened.”
