Natalie Gauci, the 26-year-old of Maltese descent who won Australian Idol, will be performing on the final night of the Malta Song for Europe festival, the MaltaSong board announced yesterday.
Natalie's guest appearance was made possible after a joint effort between timesofmalta.com, MaltaSong and the National Lotteries Good Causes Fund.
Natalie won Australian Idol on November 25 when she beat bookies' favourite Matt Corby, and has since been signed by one of the major record labels - Sony BMG. She also released her first single, Here I Am, which made it to second place in the Australian singles chart after just three days. The video to the single will be available on this site in the coming days.
Natalie's first album with Sony, Natalie Gauci: The Winner's Journey was released on December 8. Samples of the tracks of her album are available at: www.timesofmalta.com/nataliegauci .
Natalie has been on a national tour since January 2 and has performed at various prestigious Australian venues among which were two performances this week at The Palms at the Crown Casino in Melbourne.
Speaking to timesofmalta. com, Ray Gauci, her father, said "the audience just loves her". Originally from Marsa, he said the show at The Palms was fantastic and the "crowd at her hometown are wonderful people... they embraced her with open arms".
She has another performance today at the same venue and will then fly to Tasmania where she will give a performance at the Derwent Entertainment Centre.
Having a jam-packed agenda, Natalie will be flying out of Perth on January 24 immediately after a performance at the Burswood Theatre. She will be landing in Malta the following day. This will be her first time here.
Timesofmalta.com had interviewed Natalie soon after she won the Idol competition and, since then, timesofmalta.com, MaltaSong and the National Lotteries Good Causes Fund have been working hand in hand to make the event possible.
After the deal was finalised, Natalie could not retain her emotion and, screaming with joy, she told timesofmalta.com, "This is such fantastic news. I can't wait to board the plane and be there".