Duo Transcend Flips into the AGT Finals
Southern Virginia Student Cheers On Her Sister
By Kelsie West
“Watching the live show is definitely scary,” said Kimberly Anne Wolfe, ‘22, about her sister Mary’s blindfolded trapeze performance on America’s Got Talent. Mary and Tyce Nielsen, known on stage as Duo Transcend, are one of the top ten finalists.
“This is the first act of its kind that I could see going into the finals of America’s Got Talent,” Simon Cowell told the couple after their first performance on the show. A couple of shows later, after a high risk blindfolded act, they made it to the finale.
The duo had the audience on the edge of their seats when Tyce placed a blindfold over his eyes midway through the performance. Tyce meant to catch Mary, but her leg slipped and he dropped her. Standing up, Mary asked the judges if they could try the trick again. “You almost got hurt very badly and your first thought was ‘Let me do that again’,” remarked celebrity judge Howie Mandel. “Only on America’s Got Talent does that happen.”
Mary and Tyce’s job is riskier than the average day job. “People might be surprised because they see our act now and they think it is dangerous, but we’ve actually stopped doing other tricks that are even more dangerous since we’ve had our child,” Mary told PEOPLE magazine.
Their 2-year-old son Jaxx is the driving force behind their decision to audition for the show. Winning America’s Got Talent would enable them to settle in Vegas with a show of their own. They would no longer need to travel long distances and leave their son with his grandmother.
Tyce told the audience, “We’ve relied on just the feeling and the connection between each other.” Their passion and trust in one another enabled them to reenact the blindfold act on the following show, nailing the performance. Kimberly said about the routine, “Tyce is mostly blind already so the blindfold doesn’t do much.” Essentially, all of their tricks are done without vision, which increases the intensity of their performances.
The couple seems to thrive on challenges. Mary was an avid dancer in her youth. As a young adult, she was seriously injured in an accident that jeopardized her foot. While performing in a travelling circus, Mary fell from a ladder sustaining a compound fracture. The delayed ambulance prompted Tyce, not yet her husband, to pick her up and run her to the hospital a few miles away. “When Mary almost lost her foot, she learned to dance in the air,” Kimberly said.
After her accident, Tyce and Mary began partnering for trapeze performances, eventually marrying and having their son. Since then, Mary and Tyce have danced through the air together as an effort to provide for their son. “It is awesome to have family members that like that to look up to.”
The finale is today. Viewers can vote for finalists by downloading the America’s Got Talent app, calling or going to the show’s website.
