“All I want to say is no matter where you come from, where is your background, just focus – just do one thing,” Rai said. Banners at the venue read “Nepal-America Society of Kentucky” and “Bhutanese Society of Kentucky”, a striking illustration of how people from two countries that he once felt didn’t want him now claimed him proudly. Later, he performed in a high school gym for a larger crowd of Louisville’s Nepali and Bhutanese residents. A small crowd of Nepali and Bhutanese residents of Louisville gathered at the city’s airport – named after another local champion, the late legendary boxer Muhammad Ali – and greeted him as a hero. The contract calls on him to tour several countries and serve as an ambassador for the competition’s brand.īut first, he returned to Louisville – more than 7,700 miles from Nepal by airplane – with his trophy in hand. Rai spoke to Leo as he prepared to travel to Australia to perform as part of his contract with The Voice of Nepal. “I get lucky to play with him in my music video.” “He’s the superstar of Nepal industry at this moment,” Karan Rai told Leo of the actor. He has also released an album, The Kites, and shot a video for his first single, Changa, which involved him collaborating with Dayahang Rai, a revered Nepali actor. He clinched the crown as the competition’s champion in late December and with Lama performed a concert at the Pathri Morang camp, where his life began. The time – and money – Rai expended participating on the show were worth it. Louisville, Kentucky, resident Karan Rai competes on the Nepali version of the Voice, which he ultimately won in December. Rai went on to spend seven months in Nepal competing on the show’s fourth season as part of a team coached by Raju Lama, one of the brightest singing stars in the country of 30 million people. Producers notified him that he’d moved on to the next round, and he traveled to Nepal for a blind audition. Leo reported that Rai made an audition tape demonstrating how his range, from “hard rock to a delicate falsetto on more traditional Nepali melodies”, and submitted it to the show through its website. Then Rai learned online that the Nepali version of The Voice allowed anyone who spoke the nation’s language to audition to become a contestant – “including those who had been trapped between two lands that didn’t want them, in refugee camps, left without a country to call home”, as Leo’s Erica Rucker put it. The thought of participating in a reality show always appealed to him, including NBC’s singing competition The Voice, whose 23rd American season is scheduled to air beginning in March. Rai had first shown a talent for singing during his days at the refugee camp. In 2013, Rai and his family went to the US, initially spending time in Seattle, Washington, before moving to Louisville for what they considered better educational opportunities, he said. Other countries, including the US, began offering ways for refugees to migrate. “We used to get rations weekly,” including rice, potatoes and chiles, “and then sometimes we’d run out of the rations.” Rai told Leo that his family didn’t feel accepted as Nepali, and life was rugged at the camp. But they went to the refugee camps amid conflict over speaking and teaching the Nepali language. Rai’s parents were born in Bhutan and were descendants of Nepalis who went there to work. It was one of two camps remaining for people fleeing ethnic cleansing of people with Nepali roots in Bhutan – another Himalayan country – in the 1980s. Largest Selling Album of the Year – Kantipur FM Annual Award – 2002, 2003, and 2004.According to the alt-weekly, nicknamed Leo, Rai was born in 1994 in the Pathri Morang refugee camp in eastern Nepal.Best Performance by Group or Duo – Music Nepal Award – 2002 – 2003.Best Performance by Group or Duo – Aha Pop Music Award – 2002.Largest Selling Album of the year – Hits FM Award – 2002. He is one of the coaches in The Voice of Nepal. Lama is currently based in the US and Nepal. His work involves songs in Nepali, Tibetan, Tamang and other languages. He is the main singer of the musical band Mongolian Heart.
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