Massapequa Park's Jesse Findling advances to 'American Idol's' Top 30

With his sterling rendition of Adele’s "Love in the Dark" on Monday’s Hollywood Week episode of "American Idol," Massapequa Park’s Jesse Findling made it to the top 30 on this 24th season of the ABC singing competition.

Judge Luke Bryan was knocked out by Findling's performance, saying "You are so deserving of this time in your life, right now, to be discovered on this platform and I’m so excited to see your future.”

"There were a lot of emotions going on at once" as he prepared to perform at Belmont University’s McAfee Concert Hall in Nashville, Tennessee, where the episode shot in November, the 20-year-old told Newsday. "But I've always said, ‘Let me focus on what I can do, which is sing the song, and however they react is how they react.’ So I practiced the song a bunch and it went super well."

And while ecstatic about continuing on, "It was so sad because so many of the friends I made that weekend of Hollywood Week went home. We all got so close and we were in the same hotel and we were doing all these things with each other. So that was the hard part, honestly."

Following his audition in Nashville last autumn, which aired Jan. 26, "I flew back [to Long Island] on a Sunday and then Hollywood Week was that next weekend," says Findling.

Fortunately, he was able make a choice quickly. “ ‘Love in the Dark’ by Adele has always been a song I had on the back burner," he said of the 2015 cut from her album "25." "I was, like, this would be a great song with a live band behind me. It's a super grand song. It feels big and I wanted a song that felt like a transformation from my audition and that a band could enhance. And her as an artist, I love."

The 2023 Massapequa High School graduate, who appeared in musical theater there and has continued to at Binghamton University, where he is a junior majoring in biology, has taken this spring semester off from school. "My grades are good and school is always there and I will eventually go back," he says, "but I just decided to ... try to make the singing thing work out."