She’s the winner of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2015 and one of the most recognisable faces (and voices) on the sunny island of Malta.
And on Saturday evening Destiny Chukunyere took her talents north to the United Kingdom where she wowed judges with her cover of Aretha Franklin’s “Think”.
Accompanied by her grandmother, the 14-year-old star was uncharacteristically nervous during her pre-performance voiceover and when she took the stage to chat with the judges, led by Simon Cowell.
But all that changed the moment she started to sing.
Destiny’s audition on Britain’s Got Talent
“My dream is to win,” she said in her voiceover as she strutted onto stage. “Who knows? It might change my life.”
After Destiny introduced herself, Simon asked her how she ended up singing in London.
“I won Junior Eurovision 2015,” she said, her voice quivering.
“I didn’t know there was one,” he said.
When judge Alesha Dixon asked her if she was confident, Destiny spoke from the heart.
“For now no. But when I start singing I’m a different person.”
And she proved the point with a spot-on cover of Aretha Franklin’s “Think” — serving the sass, attitude and on-point vocals that Junior Eurovision fans have come to expect from her.
The audience, totally enraptured by her performance, gave her a standing ovation along with the judges.
“For me that was knockout,” Alesha said. “That is one of the hardest songs to sing and you are 14 and killed it. Brilliant audition.”
Judge David Walliams — perhaps best known for his comedy series Little Britain — had a series of questions: “What happened to the shy 14 year old girl from Malta? Where did she go?”
“You are clearly born to sing. Thank you for coming along today to our little show.”
Judge Amanda Holden was as effusive, praising Destiny’s demeanour, which contrasted so sharply with her power vocals.
“Aside from the fact that you’ve got the most incredible voice, you’re just such a cute, sweet girl,” she said. “Incredible audition, well done.”
And finally Simon — easily one of the most difficult men to please in all of reality TV — issued his verdict.
“Destiny. I’ve been waiting for someone to come out who we think could be a star and guess who it is? You. You have soul.”
Afterwards a visibly touched Destiny shared a brief word with hosts Ant & Dec.
“It felt awesome,” she said. “I want to go again.”
Destiny at Junior Eurovision 2015
Destiny is no stranger to our readers, who first fell in love with the soulful singer back in 2015, when she represented Malta at the Junior Eurovision Song Contest in Bulgaria.
Her song “Not My Soul” matched her voice perfectly, letting her show off her power, control and rhythm. As we wrote at the time:
Young Destiny serves Aretha Franklin realness from the very first note. The song is well-paced, builds from verse to verse, and gives Destiny plenty of space to fill it with her enormous vocals and range. It hints at black spirituals from the American South and funky jives straight outta Motown. Yet this remains accessible to kids. They can’t take Destiny’s soul, and honey, they can’t take her voice either! My favourite song of the year.
Destiny may sing as well as the divas she admires — including Beyoncé and Aretha — but she’s most definitely not a demanding diva who throws her cell phone at lackeys.
The young star has kept her feet on the ground, despite being one of the most in-demand talents on the island.
At Junior Eurovision 2016 in Valletta, she kindly took time out of her busy schedule to perform at The Wiwi Jam — our concert and party at the Hard Rock Café.
She reprised her winning song “Not My Soul” and also sang “Embrace” — the official anthem of Junior Eurovision 2016.
About a fifth of all wiwibloggers live in the UK, and you better believe that we’ll be voting up a storm to support young Destiny in the weeks ahead. We hope all of you in Britain will too.
If she wins this, I want her to go on and rep the UK at the Eurovision in two years (she’ll be 16 then). Who knows, maybe then, the UK might finally win again?
Love how many Europeans want to go on UK X factor, Britains got Talent etc and they “love” the UK….however when it comes to televotes in Eurovision that “love” does not translate.
the photo reminds me of bugs bunny
Go Destiny <3 Malta is full of stars, if only they get appreciated 😀
She may represent Malta, but not before she’s 16. She’s 14 now, damn… Born in august, that means she won’t be eligible to participate in Eurovision Song Contest until 2019. Malta may win Big Eurovision, too…but with the right song. But considering the fact it’s Malta we’ll probably see another ballad, as they’re mostly into ballads (Chiara, Claudia Faniello and so on)… Good luck, Destiny!
She must go to ESC representing Malta, she will slay and who knows, maybe even achieve Malta’s first victory 🙂
Malta 2020
She is 1000000 times better than any singer from Senior Eurovision 2017!
What a voice!!!!!!!
Let’s not get carried away. 🙂
“Underage power girl with a voice better than expected blowing away a talent search jury performing an Aretha Franklin/Whitney Houston song” has become a cliché of its own. Destiny is a good vocalist, but I think she has to find her own – more genuine – style if she wants to make it big in the music business rather than becoming a forgotten child star (and I do think she has the talent to become a respectable pop singer, especially in a country as small as Malta). Chances are that she’ll represent her country at the Eurovision Song Contest in… Read more »
Indeed. I started singing on stage when I was 6. I was first filmed at age 8. It was alot of fun because it was non-competitive and mostly with other kids. But these “competitions” would have destroyed me as a child. What’s more, I had enough stigma to face on my own at school by just being in theatre and being labelled as “camp” and “gay.” Displaying all that in front of millions through TV would have made my public education impossible. (I bearly survived the school process as it was – there was far too much physical and verbal… Read more »
I agree M_K, but isn’t that true for most acts appearing on these shows? They are only allowed to sing covers and are hailed by judges as being “the next” or “a little” or are told “you remind me of”. The Eurovision Song Contest is one place where we can at least get new songs, but I worry it is now being consumed by reality talent TV.
Yeah, it’s true for most acts on these shows and I guess it’s the reason why most of them disappear into obscurity after a short climax.
I like the general principal of Britain’s Got Talent (from around the world), but I can’t stand two aspects:
1. Child performers.
2. Animal performers.
N.B. I would absolutely LOVE for Kasia Mos to show up and talk about how she doesn’t want animals on chains, right before the next dog appears with a control collar. 😀
(And no, I don’t like JESC either.)
when i go to veterinary with my dog, the doctor always says that we should not watch these shows. hope the doctors will make more to raise awareness. and about children, i would never want my child on tv. from all reasons, at least because in a few years will be ”over”. even thinking selfish, the parents must know that the public grows tired and bored very soon, and the child will not have a career at all in a few years. yes, there are exceptions, but most child stars don’t survive because they change, they are not cute anymore,… Read more »
Her performance was brilliant! Hope she goes far!
don’t this show has an age limit?
but good for her tho. can’t wait to see all her performances on the show.
If you’ve got a talent, regardless of age, you can enter
Well I suppose no-one gets paid to be on this show, so there are no “child labour” issues. In theory.
There are, however, other moral issues. Happy debating.
Good luck to her!
I think it is sad that winning JESC is not enough to get your career properly started and that she still feels she needs to take part in a show like BGT. I mean, it’s frustrating to see the likes of her and Saara Aalto having to explain who they are to the likes of Amanda Holden or Sharon Osbourne!
She absolutely killed it, I watch BGT all the time, apart from the choir and the bollywood dancers she’s the only one that stands out to me
She will win Malta’s first victory at Eurovision as soon as she is allowed to sing there….
This is why Europe is jealous of us. In other countries if you win the talent show you get to compete in Eurovision, but in the UK its if you win Eurovision we might give you a spot in our own contest.
You may have won JESC girl but you’ll find BGT a lot harder, wish you the best of luck
She had diction problems and seemed really nervous here unlike in JESC and other gigs she did. Hopefully she will get more confident later on the show. I will be voting for her all the way through!
The new Saara Aalto
I am aware of Destiny winning the junior Eurovision, but I don’t follow that contest to be honest. So, I didn’t know how Destiny sings.
Fortunately, I found it out and she was amazing!! “Think” is a difficult song to sing and she blew everyone away!! I was shocked when I heard how she sings! She is just great and she’s only 14!!
Destiny, do me a favour:
in a couple of years, when you’re able to participate at Eurovision can you represent Malta with an amazing song and SLAY??
Well done to her! BGT is a big platform for her to market herself. However, I think in her audtion, she should have sang her winning song, it would make her even more unique in the fact that not many British people would have heard “Not My Soul”, especially Simon, who hadn’t even heard of JESC!
Maybe she will keep it for the live shows :/
Maybe her success will bring the UK back to Junior Eurovision 😉
Yeah that American girl Grace sang an original for her audition and she won!
That’s why I prefer JESC over ESC – in junior eurovision you get someone like Destiny, in the adult you get dancing gorilas and yodeling + bonus lecture what is good music by the winner. Kids do it better 🙂
Ha ha….the last part was super funny. 🙂
Yeah but in Jesc the children can’t say their country’s points in a sensible manner PLUS THE SONGS ARE QUITE UM HOW CAN I SAY IT MEDIOCRE,STUPID WITH NO MEANING THAT’S ONLY SOME SONGS AND THE CONTEST RULES ARE QUITE SILLY like every country starts with 12 points why can’t they just fight for points starting at 0 like adult eurovision and they can have the same voting system in adult eurovision is jury votes announced separately and televotes together in junior it’s just jury so when you think of it even though adult eurovision has gimmicks it still better… Read more »
That’s nitpicking. It is not like esc doesn’t have problems and contradictions – in fact esc has many meaningless or stupid songs. The rules need to change for both so why single out jesc? And what if they start with 12 points? It doesn’t matter in the end (actually the last contest, I may be mistaken, but I don’t remember the kids’ getting the extra 12 points. With jesc, despite all problems surounding it, is better platform to spread love and friendship – that is suppose to be esc aim as well… but we all see what has the contest… Read more »
I really hope that she does well, even though I am not a fan of the show in general. As for the audition piece, this would have been well planned in advance and agreed with producers. They do not simply turn up on the day and sing on a whim. In fact, it may very well be the case that the producers of the show approached Destiny and invited her to perform on the show – this is what they have done in the past with others. Not everything is as it appears on TV. Don’t take everything at face… Read more »
She is good , and it’s so cool and funny when she transforms herself from shy girl , to confident “beast” when she start to sing hehe
These talent shows are so sordid and grotesque. Please, Wiwibloggs, lets just pretend that they don’t exist.
Also, why does she audition with the song she won the Maltese national selection 2 years ago? Has she not discovered, achieved, accomplished something new and worth showing in these two years? Why recycle the same two-years-old performance? She is still a child, but whoever is guiding her in this process is not doing a good job. Anyway, good luck to her in her career and hopefully it will be managed better going forward.
dude…chill… if you feel you can do better just go and win JESC and get 4 yes-es on BGT and then you have the right to talk about this great talent. 😉
I hope she will win this too! She is a legend!
Am I missing something? What exactly is the connection between British talant and the Maltese winner of JESC? How is she Brittish? And how is she a fit for a talent show, when she obviously sings professionally and even won JESC? How about having the rest of JESC and ESC audition too? Please, this is ridiculous and bad publicity for her. It is time to write your own songs, Destiny, and not pretend you need to be discovered, and in Britain of all places…
Malta was once part of the United Kingdom, as an overseas territory in the same way Gibraltar is still, however it got its independence in the 60s but still remains in the Commonwealth.
So yeah, Malta and Britain have a connection of sorts.
Plus the fact that the competition is open to anyone. Hungarian dancers won a few years ago.
And a magician from Canada placed top 5 in 2014. America’s Got Talent has also welcomed foreign acts, a couple of years ago a British ventriloquist (Paul Zerdin) won, and last year The Clairvoyants, a mentalist duo from Austria, placed runner-up.
The Got Talent shows welcome people from all over, so why can’t the British embrace Destiny, who wants to make her dreams come true outside of winning JESC? I wish her well in her BGT quest
Well, yeah, Malta was part of the British empire – along with half of the rest of the world, including the US, Australia, India, Ireland, a large part of Africa etc., so I guess they have a “connection of sorts”, but that seems a pretty tenuous link for entry into Britain’s Got Talent. In any case, they’re lucky to have her.
To wrap up this brief history lesson, it’s okay for Britain to invade half the planet and enforce their rule, but god forbid some EU migrants come over and “take their jobs”. #Brexit
There were also a group of musicians form Portugal that participated in the spanish show and a spanish musician that participated in the portuguese version. These shows aren’t just restricted to participants from the countries that they being produced on.
Yeah while the show mainly focuses and gives a lot of screen tome to British acts, Britain’s got talent its open to anyone now. In the same show there where also acts from Germany, France, Japan and Ireland.
People don’t really mind it since we’ve realised the British acts these days are usually just singers and dancers, so the foreign acts bring more diversity
Last season saw someone from Finland’s national selection take part in The X-Factor UK, Simon’s other show, and slayed her way to top 2.
A few years before, a group of sisters from the Philippines auditioned and went on to reach the live shows.
Go destiny!! Chase your destiny 🙂
Winner! Destiny will win hands down.
Not *her* soul