NYC, NJ singers to showcase their vocal chops on ‘American Idol’

nypost.com:

Ajii Hafeez, who credits his keyboard teacher at Ditmas Junior High School for inspiring him.“Shout out to Mr. Kass. He was the greatest teacher ever,” he told The Post. “He took music seriously and … would go hard to make sure that we sounded good.”His audition impressed Richie — who said, “Hallelujah,” once he heard him belt out his first line.

Hafeez, 27, said he had no time to revel in that moment.“My mindset was, ‘Hey, you gotta finish the song,’ I could have frozen up, but I just kept going,” he recalled.Born and raised in Flatbush, Hafeez works the overnight shift at the front desk of a nursing home — and it was his coworker, Claire, who encouraged him to try out for “Idol.”“She would just hear me singing behind the desk, in the hallways, and would just tell me all the time, ‘Dude, have you applied?'” he said.He said patients at the nursing home are sending their support.“I have a few patients that reach out all the time,” he said. “It’s a big family.”Hafeez, whose parents are natives of Pakistan, explained on the first episode of the season that they “didn’t have the means for music school … so my hometown was my teacher.”While he was in high school, he would perform at his older pals’ college talent shows at schools like Baruch. “I had friends that were in college and they’d be like, ‘Hey, you want to come sing at my talent show?'” he recalled.

He will watch the show on Sunday — where he’ll be singing Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Simple Man” — with his father.“My mom is usually working, so she sees from her phone,” he said.Hafeez said “words can’t explain” what the encouragement from his parents means to him.“They’ve been there like, ‘Hey, you’re still you, and you just got to go there and be yourself and have fun, that’s.