Idol Stalker

Final 12 Performance Show - Part II

by Jason on March 13th, 2007

Up first after the break is Phil Stacey.

Phil Stacey
Diana really likes the song he’s selected because she sang it with Marvin Gaye. “Make You Love Me”, working out his Harry Connick, Jr. vibe on this song. Love song crooner. He’s really throwing hte guantlet down for himself on this performance. A little falsetto highlight at the end of some notes. I like this song choice because it mixes some nice ballad melody with plenty of energy to highlight his stage presence. I’m really glad to see him step up the performance tonight. By FAR the best male performance tonight.

• Randy: performance was a little boring, vocals were hot!
• Paula: didn’t like the song, but vocals were great, strong vocals
• Simon: right temp, okay, very good song choice, when he’s trying to hit the big notes he shouts, wasn’t outstanding, wasn’t awful, better than last week

— Commercial Break —

LaKisha Jones
Choosing “God Bless the Child” which is a Billie Holiday song and Diana Ross played Billie in the movie. Interesting question about whether or not to use the mic stand. I’m not sure, I mean I really like LaKisha and this is a great performance of the song. I’m just not sure it’s the song that’s going to connect with the audience like it needs to be connecting to them. She’s going to really need to end it on a very memorable climax and really capitalize on the performance as a whole.

• Randy: perfect song choice, loves the outfit, unbelievable vocal, didn’t overdo. “That was sensational”
• Paula: beautiful performer, beautiful girl, heart came through in the song
• Simon: you’ve either got it or you haven’t got it and she’s got. The quality difference between her and Melinda is that the two of them are in a completely different league. Outstanding. Not intimidated by the stage, audience or band.

— Commercial Break —

Blake Lewis
Putting a “modern spin on a Motown classic”. He’s totally transitioning the song from the 60’s to today “You Keep Me Hangin’ On”. I like the modernization, but I’m not sure it’s up to the par we’ve come to expect from him. This may be one of his worst performances in my mind.

• Randy: good things about it, don’t worry about “Blake-izing” every song. Let his vocals come out, let the classics be the classics.
• Paula: real good singer, she could have a hit again with it
• Simon: didn’t get that, didn’t get it at all, understood his reason, didn’t “sound” as good as we’ve heard him previously

Stay tuned after the break and the jump for Chris Richardson and Stephanie Edwards

— Commercial Break —

Stephanie Edwards
She’s in love with Diana Ross. Diana says for Stephanie to build up the “sexy” in the song and deliver it. Diana says she has “star quality”. Singing “Love Hangover”, Stephanie is highlighting that she has the vocal strength to compete with the other girls in this competition. She’s going to have to keep picking the right songs to be sure and highlight her skills. I’m not sure if this was a good song choice for her though.

• Randy: yo, forgetting a bit of the words, good vocals, strong choice, perfect choice
• Paula: should have taken advantage of putting the up-tempo section in
• Simon: straight arrangement of the song, felt like singing an intro, didn’t close particularly well. Outsung by LaKisha and Melinda. Multitude of songs to choose from and she chose the wrong one tonight.

Chris Richardson
Singing “The Boss”. Was star struck with her. Needs to find the hook and work the audience with the song. Encouraging him to move around a bit, sounds really good. I’m sure he won’t have a problem moving around. I’m not sure what happened to Chris. He used to impress me much more than he has the past few weeks. It’s weird, ever since he sung the country song, it sounds like he’s always singing threw his nose now. Not an endearing quality for me when it comes to music.

• Randy: holding the line for the boys, not his best performance, half and half on good and bad
• Paula: nailed the blend of bringing the contemporary to a classic, played with the vocals and did a great job
• Simon: just listening to the vocals, it was dreadful. thought it was vocally “terrible”

— Commercial Break —

Jordin Sparks
Diana believes that Jordin is absolutely gorgeous, but needs to communicate to the audience and project the song into the audience and connect with them. “If We Hold On Together” is a very slow tempo song to wrap up the night. I’m curious as to if the contestants know what slot they’re performing in when they pick a song. If I knew I was wrapping up the night, I’d want to come out and a nail a really high energy performance to be as memorable as possible going into the lighting up the phone lines with voters. A little too much vibrato in areas and pitchy in other areas. Screaming some of the big notes.

• Randy: at 17, he’s so impressed with her, Jordin made it a 3-girl race tonight with her song
• Paula: natural gift, a breath of fresh air, beautiful and can sing her heart out
• Simon: was a little bit gooey, totally agree and thought it was a very, very good vocal. Put herself in to be in the finals of this competition.

After some of the performances tonight and the variety of responses of my own opinions and the judges from my own and each others, music is so much a personal preference and taste for each individual.

I believe it should be Sanjaya to go home this week, but knowing that, it will probably end up being Brandon Rogers.

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