After battling an eating disorder and the pressures of fame, former child singing sensation Jackie Evancho is making a comeback — and this time it’s personal.
The “America’s Got Talent” star, and youngest ever solo artist to have a platinum record, is releasing a recent single next week called “Behind My Eyes.”
Nevertheless it’s not just like the opera arias or classical songs that made her famous as a 10-year-old on “AGT.” As an alternative, the now-23-year-old is branching into alt-pop.
“I wrote the song about what it seems like to go crazy or to start out losing touch with reality,” Jackie told The Post after her Daintree NYC photo shoot. “My songwriting as of late touches upon mental illness and issues which can be on the darker side, which is able to shock a variety of individuals who know me from before.”
By “before,” Jackie is referring to her whirlwind classical music profession that began when she was 9. While her peers were riding bikes with their friends and complaining about homework, the Pittsburgh native was entering singing competitions and thrilling audiences along with her sweet, golden voice.
In 2010, she got here in second during Season 5 of “America’s Got Talent,” but won the hearts of America for her renditions of “O Mio Babbino Caro,” and “Time To Say Goodbye.”
Buoyed by her success, Jackie’s adolescent and teenage years were spent recording albums with super producers like David Foster, headlining live shows, meeting Oprah Winfrey (“Oprah’s a terrific hugger”), doing a duet with Barbra Streisand, appearing in a movie with Robert Redford (“The Company You Keep”) and, somewhat controversially, singing at Donald Trump’s 2017 Presidential inauguration.
And while performing the National Anthem was a bucket list moment for her, Jackie did face backlash for being a part of Trump’s inauguration. As a young person, she claims didn’t grasp the political implications of being an element of Trump’s orbit, when so many other artists said “No.”
“I said ‘Yes’ because I used to be singing for my country,” Jackie said. “Nevertheless it hurt my profession and it just sucks because, as a 16-year-old, I perceived it as an honor. And it’s form of sad that also to today, people don’t understand that.
“Now that I’m older and in a position to vote, I probably would have passed on that chance.”
Moreover, the “Dream With Me” singer revealed to The Post that her fast-paced childhood led to mental health issues and anorexia.
“Growing up within the highlight, there was a variety of pressure,” Jackie said. “There have been times that I might cry because I wanted to hang around with my siblings and friends and just be a child, but I needed to work.”
Her family, too, struggled with the pitfalls of fame by way of coping with a scarcity of privacy, questions of safety, and unrealistic expectations of what success looked like.
One other dark side of stardom was maintaining along with her appearance. Jackie vividly remembers being 15 and considering that her stomach looked fat.
“It triggered something in my head,” she admitted. “And from that time forward, I used to be attempting to shed weight in any way possible. I attempted the healthy way — barely decreasing the caloric intake, figuring out, maintaining a healthy diet — but I wasn’t getting the outcomes I wanted quickly enough, and it just spiraled from there.”
In the total throes of anorexia, the “Two Hearts” singer would go days without eating.
“I felt like crap day by day,” Jackie recalled. “I didn’t have any energy to maintain up with my personal life and my work life. Eventually, I needed to stop performing because I used to be in a treatment center. Once I got out, things didn’t improve. And so, a couple of years later I went back to a different treatment center.”
Now she is sharing her story because she desires to help people who find themselves similarly battling eating disorders. Especially since Jackie’s anorexia led to early osteoporosis: A 2021 automobile accident revealed she has the bones of an 80-year-old.
“I’m still fighting it and confronting it,” Jackie acknowledged. “I’m still being treated, and I even have a therapist. There’s no shame in that. Humans should not perfect creatures. We’d like help. And I would like to point out those who is okay.”
As she’s working through these issues, a part of her therapy is writing songs about her experiences — each good and bad.
“Get Out of My Life,” a song she’s been workshopping, is a first-rate example of her recent agency.
“It’s about confronting all of the people in my life who’ve put this pressure on me, or a minimum of made me react by putting pressure on myself to be perfect,” Jackie said. “The song’s mainly me saying, ‘I’ve had enough. I actually tried, and I can’t keep doing it anymore, so get out of my life.’”
Now not the “perfect little girl,” Jackie has moved from Pittsburgh to Manhattan’s Upper West Side and is making her own decisions about her life and music.
“I didn’t even really know who I used to be musically because I’ve been doing the identical thing since I used to be 10 years old,” Jackie, who performed with Andrea Bocelli in 2015, said. “So, I actually dove deep and caught up with myself. And I discovered a recent sound that could be very real to me.”
Jackie is relaunching her singing profession in a more holistic way with a recent record label, Melody Place. She describes her 2.0 sound as “alt pop,” and her songs are deeply personal.
To date, the response from her fans has been overwhelmingly positive. “The support has been great,” Jackie said. “It shows me how loyal of a fan base I even have, and it makes me love them even greater than I already did.”
Jackie is most pleased with beating Michael Jackson’s reign because the youngest star on the Billboard charts along with her “O Holy Night” EP (she was 10); Jackson had previously set the record on the age of 11.
As a part of that journey, Jackie was mentored by legendary record producer David Foster.
“I used to say that he was my music father because I worked with him for thus a few years and grew up with him,” the three-time Billboard Top 10 chart topper said. “He really taught me that simply because something’s good doesn’t mean you stop there. You may at all times achieve greatness.”
And while the 2 remain on good terms, Jackie said “their paths split” after Covid.
And, yes, Jackie still watches “AGT.”
“I’ll at all times be glad about ‘America’s Got Talent’ and shows like that,” she said. “They definitely give talent a possibility to be seen. Today, it’s a little bit of a challenge for them due to TikTok and YouTube, but there are such a lot of individuals who love these shows and watch them as a part of their family tradition.”
Photos: Tamara Beckwith/NY Post; Stylist: Tricia Warren; Stylist Assistant: Devyn Warren; Hair/Makeup: Christina Turino; Location: Daintree, NYC