‘The Voice’ Season 22: How Kique Pulled Off a Performance While Sick With COVID
Kique’s performance on The Voice looked a bit different last night, Nov. 28. Instead of performing live at The Voice soundstage with the other Top 10 artists, the 18-year-old Miami native sang in a pre-taped video from a remote location. Later, The Voice viewers learned that Kique tested positive for COVID. In an interview after his performance aired, the Team Gwen artist reflected on his unique experience and how it felt to sing while sick.
What happened to Kique on ‘The Voice’ during the Top 10 live show?
The Voice Season 22 Episode 20 featured a Fan Week theme, where the Top 10 performed songs chosen by their fans. Unfortunately, Kique’s illness meant he couldn’t be there live and in person. However, viewers still got to see him sing his fan-picked tune: “Call Out My Name” by The Weeknd.
Right before his performance, host Carson Daly revealed that Kique “could not be with us in person tonight,” but they had a pre-recorded performance from another location ready to go. COVID didn’t seem to affect Kique’s vocals at all, as he belted out raspy high notes and showed off his range.
After the performance, the teen hopped on a video call to chat with coaches Gwen Stefani, Blake Shelton, Camila Cabello, and John Legend. Kique revealed that he wasn’t “feeling too great” after testing positive for COVID, but he was happy to still be part of The Voice Fan Week in some way.
“I am so unbelievably proud to be your coach,” Gwen told Kique. “You are absolutely flawless. … The fact that you have to be sick right now, I’m so sorry, but I’m praying for you and I’m voting for you. So is America!”
Kique says it was ‘really weird and different’ to perform on ‘The Voice’ remotely with COVID
Speaking to Parade after the show, Kique revealed that he was very stressed about the situation because he recorded his performance on Sunday, meaning he had less time to perfect it. He also felt a bit uncomfortable in the studio.
“I was unfamiliar with the space, there’s no crowd, there’s no people, it’s me and the cameras and the lights. It was really, really weird and different. I felt like I didn’t have the energy from the crowd, obviously, that you want,” Kique said.
Still, Kique was “forever grateful to NBC” for helping him perform on The Voice with COVID.
“They pulled out all the stops. They did everything they could possibly do so that I could have my best possible performance,” he added. “Obviously, the conditions weren’t the best as they could have been for what I had to do, but I’m happy with what I did. I kind of put it all out there. … At the end of the day, I’m happy and I’m grateful that I’m still here.”
Did Kique’s performance give him an unfair advantage?
Some fans weren’t sure about the fairness of Kique’s performance. In a live discussion of the episode on Reddit, some pointed out that he could have an advantage by not having to sing live, unlike the other performers. However, others argued that not performing live is actually a disadvantage.
“The context of a live show, the audience, the hype — a lot of performers thrive on this and perform better than in an empty room. And Kique really hasn’t shown any degree of performance anxiety/nerves so far this season; my bets are on him being one of these people who perform better live,” one person wrote in another thread. “To top it all off… he still has to sing WITH COVID! With an illness whose major symptoms are respiratory.”
It’s unclear how involved Kique will be during tonight’s results show. He will likely have to watch the results while under quarantine in his hotel room, but he may be unable to perform if he ends up in the Wildcard Instant Save again. The Voice could have another Adam Levine/Reagan Strange controversy on its hands. Tune in at 8 p.m. ET on NBC to find out how it all goes down.
New episodes of The Voice air on Mondays and Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on NBC. Next-day streaming is also available on Peacock.
