Chicago’s Jesse White Tumbling Team exhibited their time-tested winning form Tuesday night during their quarterfinals set on “America’s Got Talent.”
Performing to the pulsating rhythms of Jamiroquai’s “Canned Heat,” the tumblers continued their quest for a $1 million prize on the hit reality competition series, once again wowing the judges and the audience inside the Pasadena Civic Auditorium.
Utilizing two across-stage runs of gymnastic mats, the team flew in and out at a frenetic pace — rolling, jumping, somersaulting and flying through the air, at one point even towering up and over the organization’s 92-year-old founder, Jesse White.
Judge Simon Cowell praised the performance, commenting: “Well, I loved your first audition, and then I was thinking, Can they make it better on the live shows? Can I be honest? It was better.”
The team is hoping “better” translated into votes, as their continuing on in the show depends on viewer voting, which ended at 6 a.m. Wednesday.
“I hope the people at home vote,” judge Howie Mandel said. Turning his comments to the audience in the building, he added, “You gotta vote.”
Eleven teams competed in this first quarterfinals heat, with South Korean magic act Hundred Fingers earning the coveted “golden buzzer” from Mandel, automatically propelling them past the semifinal rounds and into the finals in September.
The rest of the acts will know if they move on to the semifinals — or not — when the voting results are televised on Wednesday night during the results show, airing at 7 p.m. on NBC. Only the three out of the 10 remaining acts advance to the next round based on total audience votes.
Miriam Di Nunzio is the former Features Editor of the Chicago Sun-Times.
