The Voice Kids UK: Edinburgh teenager Elyssa Tait wows judges and joins team Pixie Lott

The 13-year-old’s‘ beautiful’ and ‘really special’ performance on Saturday saw the Edinburgh teen leave all four judges stunned

An Edinburgh teenager who delivered a show stopping performance on ITV’s hit show The Voice at the weekend has made it through to the battle stages of the competition.

Elyssa Tait, 13, wowed all four judges with her moving rendition of ‘Everything I Didn’t Say’ by Ella Henderson – a performance that saw the celebrity judges astounded by the maturity of the youngster’s vocal delivery and emotional attachment to the song.

Elyssa has now joined three other girls to form Team Pixie, an all-girl group led by Pixie Lott which will battle it out against each other this Saturday in a bid to reach the final stage. Speaking to the Evening News about her weekend performance, Elyssa said: “I was really nervous to go on and there were people backstage calming me down because I was so nervous. But as soon as soon as I started singing I was in my happy place.”

Elyssa Tait from Barton in Edinburgh wowed the celebrity panel with her rendition on 'Everything I didn't Say' at the weekend

The captivating performance saw judges Danny Jones and Pixie Lott turn their red chairs at the midway point of her performance, taking the teenager from Barnton to the next round where she will compete against the remaining 16 acts this weekend.

Elyssa said: “As soon as I saw them turn around I was really happy but I knew that I had to keep singing because I didn’t ruin the performance. But I was really happy and emotional afterwards.”

Before Elyssa took to the stage there were added nerves for her father, Dougie, after being told by production staff that only two of the celebrity coaches had places remaining on their team – a moment he described as ‘extremely tense.’

Joining his wife Dominique and other daughter, Jessica, at the side of the stage, Dougie said watching Elyssa perform was like ‘an out of body experience.’ He said: “I can only remember the first half of her song and then she hit the big note and we saw that one chair had turned and at that point we just started to jump up and down and cuddle. Every time I see the performance I fill up, it’s quite emotional.”

Pixie Lott and Elyssa Tait. Pixie praised the Edinburgh teenager for 'the fragility' of her falsettos adding, that connecting emotionally to song is something that is 'really hard to teach'

Speaking to Elyssa after her performance, singing coach on the show, Pixie Lott said: “I loved the fragility of your falsettos and going into the full voice – it ticked all the boxes. One thing that is really hard to teach is emotionally connecting to songs when you’re really young – it’s amazing you can already do that.”

Fellow coach, Ronan Keating added it was ‘an amazing performance’ that was ‘really special.’ Elyssa now joins Martha from Aberdeen and Tiara-Leigh and Hayla from Liverpool to form Team Pixie.

Elyssa said: “I’ve been told before that I bring emotion to a song, but I knew I had to bring extra emotion this time because that would give me a better chance of having one of the coaches turn around. Connecting with a song and the lyrics is something they always say is one the most important things.”

Looking ahead to this Saturday the talented Edinburgh singer said: “I’m really excited for this week’s show because I’ve been rehearsing with the other three girls on Pixie’s team and they’re so great to work with so I’m really excited to sing with them in the battles.” She added: “It’s been great working with them all, and because we’re an all-girl group who are roughly the same age we all get along really well and I think we all have pretty similar voices so our battle song sounds really good because our voices work so well together.”

You can follow Elyssa’s journey on The Voice Kids this Saturday on ITV at 7:30pm.