India Carney, a multi-talented solo artist and University of Colorado Boulder professor, will sing backup vocals for singer and songwriter Olivia Rodrigo during a performance on “Saturday Night Live” this weekend.
Carney has worked with Rodrigo as a background vocalist and vocal director on and off for the past two years. While Rodrigo did her most recent tour without backup singers, sometimes she and her team like to bring them back.
“They felt like this performance could use some background vocals,” Carney said.
This will be Carney’s second time performing on SNL, the first time also being with Rodrigo a couple of years ago. In addition to SNL, Carney has performed on live television broadcasts of the Grammy Awards, the BET Awards, “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” and “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.”
Carney has been touring and singing background vocals for high-profile artists for the past 10 years. She’s toured and performed with award-winning artists including Rodrigo, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Mariah Carey, Christina Aguilera and H.E.R. She also performed at Coachella in April with musician and songwriter Moby.
Carney started exploring music when she was about 4 years old. She continued to evolve as an artist growing up, attending art schools and earning her degree in music. While she was finishing college at UCLA, she was on Season 8 of “The Voice,” which she said thrust her into a different kind of spotlight that provided a whole new set of opportunities.
“I just found myself hopping from one networking event to the next and one job to the next,” Carney said.
Her job relies largely on word of mouth and being in good standing with people, rather than a traditional audition process, she said.
Carney joined CU Boulder last summer as an assistant professor of contemporary music. She intends to teach courses that extend from her skillset and offer something unique to the students. She has experience as a vocal arranger, producer, coach, teacher and touring background singer. She also has her own solo career as a songwriter and knows how to record music in a studio. She released a new single on Tuesday called “Mirror” and plans to release more music soon.
“My intention is to pull from all of those influences and life experiences and turn them into courses for my students,” she said.
Although this is Carney’s first teaching job in higher education, mentorship and teaching are not new to her. She’s been teaching and mentoring in various capacities since 2012, including mentoring other students while she was still in college and voice coaching for “American Idol” and “The Voice.” Her dad is also a teacher.
“I’m excited to find my place here (at CU Boulder) and see how I can best serve my students,” she said.
Viewers can watch Carney’s performance with Rodrigo on SNL, which starts at 9:30 p.m. Saturday on NBC or streamed on Peacock.
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