The million-dollar man: Neal E. Boyd talks about his 'America's Got Talent' win

Just a few months ago, Sikeston, Mo., native Neal E. Boyd was just your average working man — albeit an average working man with a powerful singing voice — selling insurance for AFLAC. On Wednesday night, that all changed when the 32-year-old was catapulted to instant stardom after winning NBC's "America's Got Talent" and the $1 million prize that went along with it.

On Thursday, Boyd called in for a phone interview from Los Angeles, where "America's Got Talent" is based.

Matt Sanders: So how's it feel to be the million dollar man?

Neal Boyd: It's incredible. The one thing about last night that was so surreal to me is that I had watched it start to unfold in front of my eyes when I was standing there in the top five, and you have a hundred different scenarios how it can work out. ... All this back and forth on who the front-runner was and who it isn't, first it was me, then it was Queen Emily, then it was Nuttin But Stringz, back to me, that whole thing. It shook me up to such a point, with every performance, that is reality TV, that's what it does to you, it leaves you with uncertainty, but at the same time, you know you performed well... you just don't know what to expect.

…Once they start beating to death the headline act has to be someone, and they start to categorize it, that's dynamic and spectacular, and you start to question yourself, am I that guy? You know, am I the one who could literally headline that show in Las Vegas? Am I that good, am I good enough, you know, that kind of feeling that you have?

And America said "yes." And here I am. And on Oct. 17, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, I get to be the headline act of this first show. And if the show goes well and it sells well, which ticket sales are saying that it is, that not only am I a legitimate star, but definitely a headliner, someone who can draw a crowd in.

I have so many people to thank for it, and there have been countless articles on the people who've made me who I am. The best part about my story I feel is that ... I've documented who the people are, they never have to question whether or not they were an influence on my life. If you were an influence on my life you've probably been written about ...

That's the kind of loyalty I show to my friends ... That people need to understand that I didn't get here by myself. And they also need to understand that I'm not a perfect singer and as good as I sound on TV, there will be better songs, there will be better performances based on the training I can now afford ...

I was just giving interviews with every major media outlet, on every network, on every show you could possibly imagine ... there's talk of The Tonight Show … as early as Monday night, there's talk of the album ... all this that before, was just a dream. And it's not a dream anymore.

I get to do all of this. I sat down with my manager, Peter Rudge, who is the manager currently for Il Divo, who said hello to me last night on the show … And over the course of everything going on, Peter is behind me. He was behind Il Divo and before that … the best part about Peter Rudge is he's not a lightweight. He's absolutely an incredible business manager, especially in music, working with the label Octagon -- Sony, Epic Records, who I'll be probably labeled under. But these guys are the true pros. Peter himself was originally the manager for, you know, the Rolling Stones, for Lynyrd Skynyrd, Duran Duran, and now Il Divo, and now Neal E. Boyd. I mean, he is a consummate producer, performer, I mean, he is the guy. And in the industry, I mean, Simon Cowell surrounds himself by very loyal people, much like myself. I think that's why we get along so well, is that he really understands and gets how I operate, as a performer, and how I operate as a friend, and how I operate with family, and how I operate in the community, and everything around me. It's a very tight-knit, elite group of people. I call it "Missouri."

MS: Sounds like you and Simon Cowell (producer of "America's Got Talent") have gotten to know each other.

NB: I've had a lot of, you know, encounters with him. More with Simon's people than with Simon, but Simon is, Simon is a kingmaker but more than anything Simon Cowell is a guy who keeps a very intimate circle of performers. He's all about talent. He recognizes talent, he finds it, he reaches out into the country, and he searches for it. And he understands what legitimate talent is. I don't know how he got that vibe when he was younger, but he absolutely got it. It's no different than me singing opera, I mean, there's something that you do, and you do it well. He does this well. He's turned finding talent into a business, and it's fantastic to watch him, especially for me.

I mean, last night's show … it was one of the neatest things, because Leona Lewis performed. And the thing that I know that most people don't know is that Leona Lewis was found on one of Simon Cowell's talent shows. And Leona Lewis sings a song called "Bleeding Love." Now she sings a song called "It's Only a Matter of Time." She also sings a song called "Footprints in the Sand," that was the, literally the sound bed, or the background music to my first audition. That first vignette is "Footprints in the Sand" by Leona Lewis, which connects the two of us, she and I as performers …

MS: Take us to that moment Wednesday night when it was just you and Eli Mattson on stage, and you were waiting to hear which one would be crowned champion.

NB: Eli Mattson and I are best friends: we're as close as they come, we're musical collaborators ... We like to liken to, hopefully, future legends who get together and are so cool they show up to each other's venues and have big concerts and stuff like that. That's the way we relate. We were like that with also one of the performers before, Sarah Lenore, a country singer who was voted off against Eli a couple of weeks ago. And, you know … I took him out and he took her out (laughs). But we all remain friends, and we're just kind of like, oh, this is really hard. It's all hard …

That moment was really very surreal for me, because I was sitting there next to my friend, and you're going to be happy either way, I mean, I won't be able to cope as well if I lose. But I look over and I see this face, this familiar face that's been with me since the beginning of the show. And I look over at him and I'm just like, 'Oh Lord, what's getting ready to happen?' ... I know it showed on our face, it had to have ... But it was scary, because there's a lot of things coming into play when you're doing this. You've got, A, you both want it, OK; B, you've got the anxiety that if you fail, you let down all these people that have been to the website and have seen all the articles and have been to the magazines and who believe in you. And even though they tell you that they wish you the best regardless, they still want to see you win. And if you don't, something's taken away from the entire experience. There's some little element why he didn't win, so no one from here can ever win … we just haven't gotten to that point yet where we can attain greatness …

And that didn't happen last night. What happened was, not only did we, you know, beat contemporary with something so far off the wall, but we put opera on the map again. That's the best part about it, you put opera on the map through the performance, you got through everything that you needed to get through, you sang well throughout the entire competition and you actually won it. People believed in you, and they want to hug you and kiss you. I see it all over, even the hotel here at the Sheraton Universal, I'm just bombarded with people who tell me they don't just love my performances, but tell me that they love me, and tell me that they love my music, and that's the best part about it.

I mean, it's easy to lose focus and lose your humbleness unless you're genuine, and you understand what got you here.

The fun thing for me isn't that people are giving me all these accolades and love, the fun thing for me is that people get to see someone that they care about perform well and do good, and they feel proud about what's happened and where they come from. They feel proud that they hear Sikeston on the television set, and they see my gratitude and they understand that that is exactly who I am ... I won't ever forget where I came from. How can I? It's not worth doing if the people who live where I live and grew up where I grew up and see what I see every single day ... that they feel some connection with me, because of all of this. That they love seeing me do well for myself, and they understand in themselves, you can absolutely dream big, you can dream bigger than life.

I was poor a few days ago. I was poor 10 seconds before they said I won.

I was really broke. I was sitting there trying to figure out how to pay my hotel bill.

MS: Say what?

NB: I was sitting there trying to figure out how to pay my hotel bill (joking). I'm being facetious. I've done well enough in business, I can pay my bills. I'm being facetious.

It's fun to be successful. It's fun to be confident. Being cocky is inexcusable. Being confident is acceptable, and that's what I've done. I believe in my talent, I know that when the producers are coming to me and saying 'We need to sing A, B, C, and D song and we have to have a track and it has to go on iTunes and it has to do all this stuff' … all I have to do is say, just give me the microphone. Let me show you what I can do.

Because I honed my skills in Southeast Missouri. I taught myself in Missouri. And when people say, 'Neal you need to say you're from somewhere else,' I'm like, 'No, you need to come to Sikeston, or you need to come to Cape Girardeau, you need to come to Ste. Genevieve of Perryville. You need to come to Southeast Missouri, I want to show you something.' You know, it's the character of the people … The same people in that town, who watched me perform in this thing, already watched because they believed in me enough. They'd probably heard me sing before, and they just couldn't believe that the rest of the world felt the exact same way about me as they felt the first time they heard me sing a hundred thousand times, even when I was a little kid and I wasn't all that good.

And they also realized I trained my butt off to get to where I am, you know what I mean?

MS: It didn't come free for you.

NB: It didn't come free at all. In fact, one of the funniest stories … people didn't realize the size of the scholarships I got in college weren't sizable. … I never had a full ride to any school I went to. I had to pay; you know I have over $100,000 worth of student loans just based on trying to pursue my music. You know, it takes investment in yourself, if you believe in yourself.

That doesn't take away from the schools, it doesn't take away from the fact that they didn't feel like I was worth the money, I'm sure they did. There are a hundred thousand reasons why … you didn't get a full-ride scholarship when so many of my friends did, to the bigger schools. But I had to make choices in life. I didn't go to Mizzou originally out of college, simply because my mother … wasn't feeling well, she was sick. And I made a decision to go to Southeast [Missouri State University], I made a decision to go to that school, 30 miles away from my hometown, just so I could come home any time I needed to. I did that …

Then I went to Mizzou, when the time was right … to recommit myself to music, and I did it. … In hindsight I look back at it and I realize, I made really effective decisions. And you don't know what it's going to bring but you have to trust yourself, that you're making the right choice. And I know it's not easy, and I know it's not easy for people to even believe in themselves, especially when so many people don't, you know what I mean? … More people are going to think that you're not going to be that successful.

I remember at the beginning of this show, telling people that I'm going to be on this show who told me don't get my hopes up. It's OK, because that's what people do … Unless they've ever seen great things happen … and truly believe that they can happen, they just, they don't know. And I'm OK with that too … because … even if I'm the only person in the room that believes that great things can happen, I'm fine with that. I'm fine with it, because I'm going to show everybody that it can happen.

It's kind of like a song. I had friends that told me back in the day that … high B … no one can sing that like the late Pavarotti. And I said 'Really? No one can sing that like Pavarotti? Where did this knowledge come from? Who told you that no one could sing like Pavarotti? Did Pavarotti tell you that? (Imitating Italian accent, laughing) No one can-a sing-a like-a me.' I think Domingo would second guess you on that one. The last time I checked I think Domingo thinks pretty highly of me. And I feel pretty great about that.

MS: Oh man, what was that like when Placido Domingo delivered that message Wednesday night?

NB: I thought to myself, I can't believe this guy cares enough to say something. And he doesn't have to talk to people about my talent … but it was very validating that all my work had paid off, that he was at least impressed. But the thing he understands, too, and I know this, even though he didn't say it, is that I'm 32, I'm a very young singer …

But the training that I'm going to need is going to be expensive, and Domingo understands this. He understands it's going to be expensive, it's going to be time consuming, it's going to be very, very arduous. And it's not going to happen here, necessarily. And it may happen in D.C. or Los Angeles, or it may happen in Europe, in Rome, who knows? Venice, I don't know? But wherever I need to go, I'm gonna go. I want to be one of the, I want be a great singer. I want to be that … because I believe I have the potential, of being a great singer, and it makes me feel good to know that he believes in me. And I want to believe that Pavarotti would have believed in me, too.

MS: You're going to be busy. Are you going to have time to come home soon?

NB: Yeah, I would like to think I would, I just don't know. That's the problem, my schedule, and the new people in my life, the handlers, are really, are taking advantage of the moment, and it's important that they do, or it could all go away real quick, as quick as it came. And I understand that, and it pains me a lot, that I'm going to let a lot of people down who've know me my entire life, in certain things, in events. And I don't want them to be disappointed, but know that I will make it up to them in time, that what is to come is going to be more spectacular and better than anything that is right now. And I wish that I could do everything. I remember standing on a bridge singing for Bill Emerson's bridge dedication, in the middle of a bridge, in the middle of the Mississippi River, singing The National Anthem to all these people, and paying dedication to this great man. And I'm afraid there's going to be things come up that keep me from doing it for another great man ...[Rush H. Limbaugh Sr., whose federal courthouse in Cape Girardeau will be dedicated Monday. Boyd hoped to be in attendance but likely won't make it].

And I just have no guarantees, but believe me, if anybody knows me they know I'm doing everything I can to make that a reality, but if I can't, please forgive me.

... The main thing is what's best right now for my career. And I think it would be a big disappointment to the area if I failed at this point, after all the acclaim I've gotten.

But at the same time, it's making anew.

I'm never going to be the same kid that got to do all the weddings and church gigs and all the fun stuff that people got to know me for, but when I do I hope they feel how special it is for me to come back and do these events, because I love being asked ... but … we're on the world stage now, all of us, Southeast Missouri. It's not just me; I take everybody with me, in my mind and in my heart. But it is the world stage, and there are people who aren't here in the U.S., who are overseas and are looking at me right now and going … 'We found him.' At least that's what I've been told. And they want to hear me, and they're willing to pay to see me. And I've gotta make that trek and that journey across the pond and I've gotta find out if what they're saying is legitimate. … And study with the same teachers that the greats studied with … Pavarotti and Domingo … and have them teach me the technique that made these great singers great. And if they can do that, I mean, that's the biggest testament to Southeast Missouri that there could be, in a music standpoint. I mean, it's so exhilarating to me to actually talk to these great people in the music industry, and talk to people like Il Divo and Domingo and these guys, and to know that they think I might have something special.

MS: About the million dollars, I keep hearing it's an annuity that's spread out. But it's still a really good chunk of money. Any plans for that cash?

NB: Don't ever believe what you read, actually. We'll keep it at that; let's say it's just a 40-year annual annuity.

First and foremost, I'm going to secure mom, and people in the neighborhood will realize what "secure" means (laughing). The whole town of Sikeston is behind this, but at the same time, there comes a certain level of celebrity, and the community needs to understand, they need to be respectful and mindful of my mother's space and time, same with my brother. It's important to me that they are protected by the community, and that's why she'll remain there, and if there ever becomes a situation where she's not safe, then of course, she won't be there.

That's really what's most important to me. And I have the means to protect her now, and I will. And I have the means to make sure she doesn't have to work any more, and I'll do that, too.

MS: That's pretty much what you owe her at this point, I guess.

NB: Absolutely. It's not what would I do, it's what will I do? And my mom knows that, and she sees her son become a man. She sees me go, 'OK, I can't focus on these wonderful things that are happening to me, unless you're OK.' And I'm the same way with my girlfriend Heather, and I'm the same way with my friends. It's like, 'I don't think you're safe, so I'm going to do this.' And I want to make sure that my mom is secure. And if she's secure, and my family's secure, then I'm going to be OK, and I can go off and sing at the big stages. I can go back to Carnegie Hall now; I got a feeling, pretty soon. And I can sing a concert in New York, and I'll be out in New York recording anyway. … My vocal coach, my new voice coach, her husband is Jason Robert Brown, but she herself, Georgia Stitt … is a fantastic composer. She's writing shows herself. She is a masterful composer. Very New York, very Broadway-off-Broadway … it just happened, our paths crossed. Another collaborator was Nigel Wright, who writes with Andrew Lloyd Webber … These things are so beyond understanding … that these people are writing music for me … that people one day will sing the songs that are written for me. If they're any good, which I'm sure they're probably pretty good, because you wouldn't know who these people are unless they're pretty good.

… My musical knowledge, it call came from where I grew up. And this is the main focus. Ken Dobbins [president of Southeast Missouri State University] … was in the audience, and his wife … were in the audience at the finale. I don't know if you saw them, but they were right there. Now he's given me a lot of things in life. He's given me, the watch from Southeast from my concert in 2003 at Old St. Vincent's [church in Cape Girardeau]; which I still wear, which I wore on stage, which I wore throughout the contest. He's given me the gift of believing in me enough to support me every step of the way. Now that is a big deal to me. And I'm just saying it again to people; it's a big deal to me that you support me. And this guy did. … He believed in me back in the day, he believed in me when I left and went for Mizzou, he believed in me enough to have me be the replacement for Maya Angelou in '96 [at a university event, Boyd provided entertainment when Angelou canceled an appearance]. That was a big deal. So he's kept me on the map, and he didn't have to … he's got a lot of stuff on his mind …

The thing is, nothing can be a better time than the River Campus [at Southeast], and what I just performed here, converging into one into a big concert on the River Campus. I can see it happening now, and I know it's in the cards, I know it's going to come. And that's going to be a big event in Southeast Missouri, and it should be, because everybody should be taking pride in what's going on. Of course, the bigger thing is the MGM Grand hotel this month. As soon as I can take a picture of a big billboard with my face on it I'll definitely send it back home.

But everybody should take pride in this … because we've really been put on the map. Our area's been put on the map. People are gonna be looking at us, whether it's coming from economic development to workforce investment, I don't care what's going on, I'm a part of all of it Missouri, I get it.

... It's important for me to take care of the people who made me, and that's home. And I don't want them to suffer anymore either. But at the same time, it's going to be a measured response. We're going to sit back. We're going to take care of things that need to be taken care of, we're going to give influence where there needs to be given influence, and at the same time, just being genuine, and making people proud. … That's the best gift I can give to my hometown … to not be one of these celebrities who's just so over-the-top ridiculous with his antics …

I don't have the problems other celebrities have. That's what's so refreshing to L.A. about me, is that I don't give them the grief that they give other stars. It's hard to handle, believe me. There will be small and subtle changes in my personality based on the level of pressure. … I will continue to be humble, but I will try to stay measured in my tone and response because they come at you pretty heavily.

MS: It's got to be constant.

NB: Well, it is. … My day started with interviews at 6 a.m., but I didn't get to bed last night until 3 a.m., and I'm sleeping about three hours a night, and it's not healthy. … That on top of the fact that I'm still a big guy, and I worry about myself sometimes. I sit there and I say to myself 'Oh, this is very hard.' It's very difficult and I'm exhausted.

… The best part about it is I have my closest friends and my girlfriend out here. And they're taking care of me. They're giving me the lectures: you've got to get more sleep, you gotta eat better, you gotta do this and that. And that's all I need, to be honest with you. It counteracts the 'Hey Neal, you're the greatest thing on the planet and the whole world loves you and you should jump up and down about it.' Because that, to me, isn't what makes me.

… It doesn't matter to me if the whole world loves the way I sing … It goes back to my grandmother when she said 'Sing pretty for me.' If my mom tells me I sing pretty, then I've made it, made it enough ... And if the town of Sikeston says I sing pretty, and Cape says I sing pretty, Jeff City, Columbia and St. Louis say I sing pretty, that's what matters to me. I'll throw in Joplin and Springfield because they've given me some kudos too (laughs). I sang in Branson once.

MS: The judges had some harsh words for you when you sang the pop ballad, "All by Myself." What was behind the choice to sing that song?

NB: They weren't that harsh. They weren't terrible.

It was important to me that I showed some contrast. There is a moment in the song that's played over and over again everywhere, and that's the point where you erupt into the A … Because Celine Dion erupts into that A, and I erupted, and it was a very, very powerful moment, because you are lulled into this … this melodic, hypnotic sleep …

The guy who wrote the song … he says some very pivotal words, and they are … very emotional. He was throwing his heart out there … And I connected with the song, I really did. It was sad, but it was yearning, it was longing …

People were saying, 'That's not opera. What's he doing?' Well, "Mama" [by Il Divo] wasn't opera either. "Unchained Melody" wasn't opera. But we gave five or six very different performances. And if people go back and do the YouTubes, and do the videos on NBC.com, they're going to see that these performances weren't Paul Potts [tenor and winner of last year's "Britain's Got Talent"] … they were something very different and it kept people fascinated for weeks. And it was a risk on my part, because that one sticks out, because it was so interesting … the second you hit that A that's when the talent comes out, because not everybody can do that, and I know that, and that's one of the fun parts about doing what you do, when you do it well.

It's like when Pujols hits a home run. Not everybody can hit a home run, but he can do it constantly.

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