Gettin’ Carried Away

I’m sure many of you have heard about the rapping flight attendant that wows the lucky passengers of certain Southwest Airlines flights. He’s rapped for the Will Shortz interview on NPR, he participated in a segment on Jay Leno and he is even working on a new commercial for SWA!

Meet… David Holmes, the rapping flight attendant!

If you’re on Twitter, you can keep up with David’s new-found celebrity and all of his fun flights by following him: @rapping_fa. I was honored to have the chance to ask David, a star in his own right, a few questions. Enjoy!

How did you become a Flight Attendant?

I had been working for SWA for three years already, on the ramp. For a variety of reasons, I was not happy. Luckily, Southwest encourages internal movement so we can find the right fit. I submitted my application the very day I became eligible, and was in training class three months later.

I’ve been on a lot of SWA flights, and the flight attendants have always been pretty amusing. Are you encouraged by Southwest to be entertaining? Is it part of the job description?

SWA likes us to take our personalities and incorporate them into the job. There is no “encouragement” to sing or tell jokes unless that is something we do. As far as the job description goes, we are encouraged to have fun and do a great job.

Do you remember the first time you rapped on a flight? And how did the passengers react?

I hadn’t even been a flight attendant for 30 days when I wrote the first rap, which was a very short one for the arrival. When I did it, I got a really good reaction from the passengers. My crew members were very pleasantly surprised, because they thought I was quiet and shy.

How does it feel to be a celebrity (appearing on NPR, Oprah, Leno?!)?

Of course I don’t consider myself a “celebrity”, but this has been great! I never get tired of this, and it makes my day whenever someone asks for an autograph or picture. I already loved the job, and getting noticed for this makes it 1,000 times better!

Have you ever rapped EVERY time you came over the speaker? For the instructions, for announcements, etc.

I usually try to limit the raps to one per flight, but there was one really fun flight from Columbus to Vegas on a Friday. The crowd kept asking, so I ended up rapping the opening, emergency and arrival PA’s. It was quite the party flight!

With all those YouTube clips out there, do you get recognized now when passengers board the plane?

It’s happening on each flight now. People either ask if it’s me, or they will stare at me for a really long time.

Where is your favorite place to fly to?

My favorites so far have been Seattle, Pittsburgh and Ft. Lauderdale. There are plenty of things to do in each city, and the hotel in Pittsburgh is a 20 minute walk from the ballpark.