Today we’d like to introduce you to Nyckolle Gutierrez.
Hi Nyckolle, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I am from San Jose, California. I moved three times in Northern California before moving to Flower Mound, Texas with my family when I was 16 years old (a junior in high school). After graduating, I moved to Los Angeles, CA for higher education, and I now live with my relatives!
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It was tough moving away from my home state, but to my surprise, people in Texas were accepting of me. I, on the other hand, really detested moving which also made me really dislike Texas. It was just me being spiteful, of course, but I really didn’t want to live in Flower Mound because of how much I missed my friends, family, and life in California. I wasn’t able to do much exploring when I first moved because, after half a year of living in Texas, COVID hit. The first time I was in Downtown Dallas was to watch a concert, and I fell in love with the city. I’ve always loved pretty lights, and that’s what Dallas had. I’ve always had an issue with not finding where I fit in. I never really felt at home since I kept moving to different places, and meeting different people. It was difficult having to constantly adapt, and I am naturally a more shy person, so it was hard being new. When I first attended school in TX, I was quiet in every one of my classes, except leadership. After taking that class, the next semester I took, I decided to step out of my bubble and be more outgoing. Unfortunately, we went into lockdown shortly after, and once again, no friends. Hahaha. I took my boredom to the internet and started posting on TikTok.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
When I was little, I always took videos of myself singing. I loved music and listening to singers. I always wished to be like them. At 10 years old, I took voice lessons with a teacher who specialized in musical theater-type music. After a year, all of his students including me had our recital, and our voice lesson teacher left for Hawaii after. In middle school, I started posting videos on my Instagram, and seeing comments from my friends and family encouraging me really made me feel loved. I continued posting for my own satisfaction even up to high school. I even made a separate Instagram account for my singing videos. It wasn’t until COVID happened that I was constantly on my phone, and TikTok had become huge. I started posting there because I loved the community and the music people had on the app. I posted, and at first, it got no attention. Then, out of nowhere, I hit 100K views on a singing video. Then another one with 300K. And I kept posting. I eventually hit 1M views on a video, and that for me was everything. I think people really underestimate how good of a feeling it is to be heard–to be noticed for something you love doing. I hit 5M views on another video. About a year afterward, I was given the opportunity to sing with The Filharmonic, a well-known Filipino-American acapella group. Now, I have been posting less mostly because of school, but I will start posting more in the Summer! I also go LIVE a lot on TikTok, which is probably where a good portion of my followers are from. I have a series where I “sing my followers to sleep” on LIVE, and many people join, which I am extremely grateful for!
I also am self-taught in the instruments I play. I have been playing the piano since I was 5, of course not professionally taught, so I don’t really know how to play it the “right” way, I guess. I started playing ukulele when I was in the 4th grade, and I used to perform for my class, feeling like a celebrity lol. I started playing guitar the year after. Then I started playing bass guitar freshman year. My only teacher for these instruments was YouTube!
We’re always looking for the lessons that can be learned in any situation, including tragic ones like the Covid-19 crisis. Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you can share?
I think COVID has taught me how dependent people are on each other. It is so important to support your local businesses, and times are tough. Everyone has their own story, and we should all be empathetic towards each other. It is not fair to judge someone based on your own prejudices. We should be respectful of others because we don’t know what they have experienced.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ellokcyn/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/nyckolleg
- SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/nyckolle
- Other: Tiktok URL: https://www.tiktok.com/@noxnocti
