Colonia 'Voice' Contestant: 'There's Been So Much Support from Jersey'

Woodbridge, NJ - Mike Schiavo, the Colonia, N.J. native, who is now a contestant on “The Voice” and on Team Adam (Levine), said he’s been overwhelmed with the support he’s getting from his hometown.

“There’s been so much support, especially from Jersey,” Schiavo said. ”I’ve had so many people from home reaching out. A lot of them are people who’ve seen me from the beginning — back when I used to play for rooms of 5 to 10 people — so it’s crazy to hear these people are still so supportive of me.”

Schiavo is a graduate of Colonia High School. Throughout high school he did solo acoustic shows around the Woodbridge area.

“I used to play a lot in this coffee shop in Edison — well, it was really more of a church basement, but it was called the Backstage Coffeehouse,” said Schiavo in an interview Tuesday. ”It was there that I really started to grow as a solo artist.”

And now Schiavo is singing and performing in front of millions of Americans nightly on “The Voice.” In fact, his blind audition was so good that judges Adam Levine, Pharrell Williams and Blake Shelton all fought over who would coach him. Watch his audition video HERE and watch all three judges argue over who he should choose.

“That was surreal,” Schiavo said. ”Everyone thinks it was an easy choice to go with Adam, but Pharrell has become a huge influence in my music over the past couple years and Blake does such a great job coaching his artists. It really wasn’t as easy of a decision as it seems.”

Adam Levine and Elvis big influences on Mike Schiavo

Adam Levine, along with Elvis, has long been a musical influence on Schiavo. In fact, when Mike was in elementary school, his parents bought him a guitar around the same time that he bought his first album — “Songs About Jane” by Maroon 5. Mike credits the album for propelling him into the musical direction he’s in today.

“Songs about Jane’ was the first album I ever owned and it brought me over to modern music ... but Elvis was the main thing that got me into singing and playing guitar,” Schiavo said. “I was a baseball player and I did a random school report on Elvis and literally fell in love with his music.”

He said his duet of ”She Will be Loved” with Adam Levine after his blind audition was “insane.”

“I kind of blacked out and went on autopilot,” he said. “I’m really lucky I remembered the words.”

Schiavo moved to L.A. in 2015 to pursue his music career. He currently works as an assistant manager at Hot Topic.