David Archuleta

David James Archuleta (born December 28, 1990) is an American pop singer-songwriter. At ten years old he won the children's division of the Utah Talent Competition leading to other television singing appearances.^[4] When he was twelve years old, Archuleta became the Junior Vocal Champion on Star Search 2.^[4] In 2007, at sixteen years old, he became one of the youngest contestants on the seventh season of American Idol.^[5] In May 2008 he finished as the runner-up, receiving 44 percent of over 97 million votes.
In August 2008 Archuleta released "Crush," the first single from his self-titled debut album.^[4][6][7][8] The album, released two months later, debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 chart; it has sold over 750,000 copies in the U.S. and over 900,000 Worldwide.^[9][10][11] In October 2010 he released a second album, The Other Side of Down featuring lead single "Something 'Bout Love".
In 2003, when he was twelve years old, Archuleta sang on several episodes of the television show Star Search.^[20][21][22] He ended up as the Junior Vocal Champion on Star Search 2, Losing the Junior Grand Champion title to Tiffany Evans.^[23] On one episode, he sang against then-11-year-old Alexandréa Lushington, who became a "top 20" semi-finalist on American Idol alongside Archuleta.^[21] Around the second year of being on Star Search he started focusing on the lyrics, "I didn't even pay attention to the lyrics when I was 12, 13".^[24]
Archuleta's competing on Star Search was preceded by an appearance on The Jenny Jones Show, meeting the finalists from American Idol's first season, for whom he performed a spontaneous a cappella rendition of "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going" from Dreamgirls, and received praise from Season 1 winner Kelly Clarkson.,^[24][25] and led to appearances on CBS' The Early Show, The year after Star Search he found out he had partial vocal paralysis but declined risky surgery and has said he feels he is almost fully recovered.^[18][24] He limited his singing for specific occasions like Stadium of Fire, the Independence Day celebration at Brigham Young University Stadium.^[24]
Archuleta made initial attempts at songwriting and arranging music after his Star Search experience and has written at least three songs.^[24] His first singles in 2002 included "Dream Sky High" and "Don't Tell Me".^[26]
He later recorded two songs written and composed by Merrick Christensen as a featured artist for the small demo titled Fear vs. Faith. It is available on iTunes.