Kelly Clarkson Reveals How She’s Changed Since Moving to NYC, Reacts to Kellyoke Praise (Exclusive)

Life is good for Kelly Clarkson. Her family’s move from Los Angeles to New York City earlier this year has opened up a whole new world to them — whether it’s a brisk walk to the park in the crisp fall weather or enjoying a whole new wardrobe to match the city’s energy. Life, actually, is pretty great. And things just got a little better.

ET spoke with the 41-year-old TV personality in The City That Never Sleeps on the day she launched her exclusive SiriusXM channel, Kelly Clarkson Connection, and chatted with her about the move to the Big Apple, which most certainly agrees with her because she’s glowing.

Clarkson and her children — River Rose, 9, and Remington, 7 — moved to New York City earlier this year when the daytime host of her eponymous talk show relocated from Los Angeles. Gone are the days of sitting in traffic. She and the kiddos now hit the ground like every true New Yorker.

Clarkson tells ET she and her kids walk around a lot, and that they’re also “very excited” about the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting at the end of the month. 

“Being able to be there for that,” she says. “We’ve done all the things like that. We walk around in the park. Like, we have more of a life. This is what my goal was, for us to actually engage outside our house. And you have to in New York.”

Ahead of her show’s season 5 premiere last month, Clarkson revamped her closet to stay on theme.

“We literally were like, we’re moving the show and it’s kind of an amazing thing to have an opportunity in season 5 to, like, start over,” she says. “So, nobody really gets that, like another kind of revamp. And so I literally — even with wardrobe — I was like, let’s revamp, let’s go a little elevate New York. And honestly, I think the energy of the people … we’re finishing 30 minutes early every day at the show. We’re just so on top of it and life is good.”

Meanwhile, Clarkson’s “Kellyoke” segments have been all the rage since she introduced it. And fans just can’t seem to get enough. She’s showed off her versatile and powerful voice with track renditions by everyone from Sheryl Crow to Shawn Mendes to Lizzo.

“I came into the industry covering songs and that’s what I did whenever I was a kid,” Clarkson says. “I’ve just always done it and I’ve always loved it, and a lot of my favorite artists like Frank Sinatra or Ella [Fitzgerald] or Aretha Franklin, all those artists would cover songs that everybody else would cover too and I think it’s just so cool to put your spin on it.”

She added, “I’ve already been told by people, ‘You better play your music’ because they know me. I love my music, I just don’t want to feel like a tool.”

Fans can now find the Kelly Clarkson Connection on SiriusXM’s channel 12, which will offer “the music she loves, music she’s inspired by, and the stories behind the music from Kelly’s two-decade long catalog of award-winning hits.” 

“I’m a human that loves everything from big band to rap to pop to rock to country,” she says. “I like everything. So, why can’t we listen to it all on the same station? I remember whenever I was young, hearing older people talk about stations that used to play everything from Frank Sinatra to Jimi Hendrix. I think that’s so cool, and I don’t think there’s a channel like that that’s playing everything, so I really want that. That was my big goal.”

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