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The Masked Singer winner is Amber Riley! After weeks of incredible performances as the Harp, the actress and singer walked away with the coveted Golden Mask Trophy. For her finale performance, she performed an epic rendition of Lady Gaga’s “Edge of Glory.” HollywoodLife spoke EXCLUSIVELY with Amber about her Masked Singer journey and circling back to a song she once performed on Glee.
Amber Riley after winning ‘The Masked Singer.’ (FOX)
“Honestly, it was like a week where they were like, ‘Is there a song, any song, that you’re connected to?’ It was kind of like dealer’s choice. What’s really funny is the executive producer that produced my segments on the show, he used to be a dancer on Glee. His name is Michael Riccio. He was a dancer on Glee, and now he’s an executive producer on The Masked Singer.”
She continued, “We kind of were talking about what songs to do, and I was like, ‘I kind of want to do ‘Edge of Glory’ as a wink to The Troubletones on Glee. It was one of my favorite songs, one of my favorite moments, and one of the last songs that I did in high school on that show. So I thought it was just like in competition on the show, so I thought that was a really great full circle moment.”
Now that she can talk about her win, Amber admitted that she feels “relieved because I don’t have to lie anymore. And it was such a bad lie at that. People knew it was me. It wasn’t even like a good lie. It was really hard. But I feel really excited. I really had fun on that show.”
Amber admitted that The Masked Singer has “refueled’ her as an artist. She added, “I have such a connection to The Masked Singer, so I get what people were saying when they were like, it was just one of the best experiences. No one knows who you are. When you get out on the stage, nobody has these judgments or opinions or preconceived notions about who you are as an artist. You literally just get to go out with no pressure and sing. If you’ve been in this industry for a long time, people think that they have you pegged, like you can’t show them anything new. But the only expectation that they had was to hear me sing and to guess who I am. It’s an invaluable experience, and I feel like anybody that’s been in the industry for a long time, they should do it. What other place will you go where you will have that experience?”
The Harp costume was incredibly constructed and dazzled on stage. Amber said that the harp attached to her was “so light” and “on wheels.” Over the course of her time on the show, the singer admitted that the Harp “started to feel like it was a part of me.”
Amber Riley performing as the Harp. (FOX)
However, Amber could barely see out of the Harp mask. “At this point, not seeing is a part of the competition,” she told HollywoodLife. “I literally could only see this much. I had no peripheral vision, and I couldn’t see the floor, so it really was about trusting yourself, trusting the stage. I really had to trust myself when I was on stage.”
Amber is currently working on her second EP and will release it in 2023. “I’m really excited to share that music. My first EP Riley was out in 2020, and it did really well,” Amber said. “I did that independently. This time around, I’m being just as vulnerable and just as honest as I was the first time around. I’m really excited about the music that’s coming out of the studio.”
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Actor Amber Riley participates in the BUILD Speaker Series to discuss the film "Nobody's Fool" at AOL Studios on Monday, Oct. 29, 2018, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
Amber Riley ESSENCE Black Women in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA – 24 Mar 2022
Sourse: hollywoodlife.com
