The band Della Luz that features junior Noelle Lidyoff on vocals released the single “One Woman Army” in early May. However, Della Luz isn’t angling for a traditional hit. Instead, Della Luz is a sync band with the primary goal of having songs placed in commercials, TV shows, movies, or other media. Sync music is different from writing pop, folk or gospel songs.

“Some of the songs we’re going to release in the future through Della Luz aren’t necessarily my style, but they cater to a certain image,” Lidyoff said. “You really want to focus on visuals. How could you see this song used in a commercial? The lyrics can’t be too general but they can’t be too specific either. You want it to be able to be pitched to many projects.”

The vocals on “One Woman Army” aren’t typical Lidyoff. “I usually don’t belt like that. I usually sing in my middle soprano and make it sound like a belt,” Lidyoff said. “On the bridge I belt a lot, my voice gets really dark and deep and I love the sound, but I usually sing in a different placement.”

Musicians often struggle to make ends meet with just digital downloads and live shows. Sync music, on the other hand, makes money. A song placed in a movie’s end credits can earn an independent musician up to $10,000.

“For example, our dream goal for placement of ‘One Woman Army’ would be a women’s sports commercial during the Olympics,” Lidyoff said. “It’s a female-empowerment song.”

Ninety-eight students were nominated in the vocalist category for the Orange County Register’s annual OC Artist of the Year competition. Lidyoff finished in the top five. One judge wrote, “She’ll be playing stadiums by next year.”

But Lidyoff’s goal isn’t pop stardom–she wants to do music with whatever doors open: performinging, writing or producing. “I think I want to go to college in the Nashville area,” Lidyoff said. “I want to get a music business degree and minor in songwriting and be close enough to Nashville to work on projects” like her band Della Luz and producing her own music.

This means audiences are more likely to hear Della Luz’s single “Wish You Were Mine” during a television show or film before Lidyoff herself headlines a show. “Wish You Were Mine,” with its wry humor about unrequited love, could easily be placed in a CW teen series.

It was through Sarah Grandpré that the Voices of Hope Children’s Choir were invited to perform on Hour of Power, the Irvine-based religious television program. Then Lidyoff was invited to perform on Hour as a soloist several times.

Hour “even orchestrated two of her original songs,” Lanette Lidyoff said. “And that’s all through who you meet and the friendships you make, to be honest. We’re grateful for the people she meets.”

When Noelle was 12, Voices of Hope Children’s Choir performed at Anaheim Hills’s Influence Church. Noelle, already a songwriter, shared her work with Melody Noel Hernandez, the head of a faith-based artist collective from Anaheim Hills’s Influence Church. Hernandez decided to teach Noelle songwriting.

“Melody always told me there’s a way to learn. There are rules to learn,” Lidyoff said. “And then once you learn the rules, you break them.”

Lidyoff says that “Million Little Things” was one of the first songs she felt confident about.

She wrote it by playing her guitar and experimenting with different riffs until she found a sound she liked. “I started playing that, and then I think that gave me a melody,” she said. “And then, from that melody, I kind of got a vibe for the lyrics and the mood of the song.”

She recorded a demo of it and produced it using her MIDI keyboard. “I’m always hard on my songwriting because I love to challenge myself and make things better. I’m kind of a perfectionist,” Lidyoff said. “But [“Million Little Things”] was one of the first songs where I thought, ‘This is actually good,’ and, ‘This could actually be something.’”

A few years later at a songwriting masterclass, Melody Noel introduced Lidyoff to music producer Rick Seibold, and the trio formed Della Luz. (The band’s name is semi-Spanish-Italian for Of the Light, picked for its religious overtones.)

The band’s first project was producing Lidyoff’s “Million Little Things.” “We rewrote a few things, like there was a bridge originally in this song that we took out,” Lidyoff said. “We kind of just reworked it a little bit, but most of the lyrics are original.”

Lidyoff is Della Luz’s primary songwriter and vocalist, but she has the support and experience of Noel and Seibold to help her create broadcast-quality songs. 

Although Seibold moved to Tennessee last year, he still helps Lidyoff produce from recordings Lidyoff sends him.

Lanette Lidyoff is happy that her daughter can collaborate with artists in Nashville. “So much of this music world is being authentic and showing your gift and being willing to learn and not be arrogant,” Lanette said. “Being humble goes a long way.”