The Voice 2012 has several promising contestants

[Tom22]

The thread title was (and still is) a bit of a hook.

I really enjoyed The Voice this season and I was surprised more people here weren't watching it. I didn't enjoy the last few weeks as much but that's because I don't really enjoy the idea of "competition" in singing.

It wouldn't be practical nor would it give budding artists as good an opportunity to be exposed and pushed to grow if they kept around 24 artists for 9 weeks. The drama of eliminations of contestants that didn't find a following it ok.

Once you get down to the final handful, you should have some really good singers unless a show picked and promoted pure fodder to assure that their chosen "story" played out (and they get really upset when someone like Haley changes the script)

Once you have that handful of very good singers left, it comes down largely to personal taste in styles of music with execution being a smaller and smaller part the closer you get to the end when all the remaining singers should be good at their genre. Personality is also a factor, and to me a fair factor because after all Entertainers, in the Bob hope school .. are supposed to be cordial and warm and make us feel good about the world and that has to do with connection and speaking the same language etc.

Different people will want different things… so its silly to me to figure if more people feel a connection to something that makes the one attractive to the majority “better”. In the end the “winner” is a demographic study. Getting down to a handful has more to do with skill at a given area so people fond of a type are motivated enough to vote and when there are lots of contestants people don’t need to chose and can cast votes based on merit in music types that aren’t their favorite helping hone based on quality before later people will select on preference between a remaining few strong contestants.

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On Nicholas David … he peaked for me the last time I posted. I didn’t hear anything all too special after that but the sum of his work over the season was really pretty darn good. A few of his songs are songs I both think are great songs and that I think he performed as well and uniquely different as anyone who I’ve heard sing them.

I think he is most like Haley in that he understands blues and he understands that the timing of pauses, the shuffle of a beat, which words in lyrics are annunciated and spoke and which should be slurred or alternatively be sung full throttle… he relates to songs on that level which I think is what really really distinguishes Haley as a singer to me (and she’s better at it than him.. certainly more versatile in bringing that sort of quality of interpretation across so many genres of music).

I downloaded all of Melanie Martinez’s songs. I’ve found that I’ve really really been enjoying listenting to them on my phone walking the dog. There was far more to enjoy than the moderate appreciation I had the first time I heard them… I thought they were good at first but … to me the test of good music is wanting to hear it on repeat mode.

I liked Melanie's interpretations and it also helps that I’m not as familiar with the songs she sung .. which makes them fresher to me …. And their nature is less cliché than the stuff Nicholas was singing.. cliché is something great the first time around but just beat into the ground so much it’s lost its profound charm or insight. The songs Nicholas sung are such standards and are so good that they've become cliche.. kind of like a picture of the Golden Gate bridge.. priceless, and something I never tire of seeing in person frequently..but.. I don't need pictures of it.

I thought Casadee had some really strong performances and what is more, has something very special to her voice in tone and in style that makes her a special kind of artist. When she was on stage with the stars, I really saw that .. yeah, she belongs in the big leagues.. she had something equally special when side by side with them, where terry and Amanda seemed to pale to me sitting next to the super stars.
Cassadee will wander on pitch, especially in her lower range… but as an artist, she brings that around in a way that seems to create a special vulnerability to those words in that range (and thankfully , the lower tones are often the more vulnerable moments as written). I really felt a window to her heart as well as an interesting broadness to her tone mid range (and creative use of her personal bag of tricks to emphasize lyrics).

Terry and Amanda (and I see them in a very similar light) … had tremendously powerful voices, and also possessed an ablity to sing the non diva moments of songs with affection . What they were missing to me was that certain kind of special window to the heart, as well as that undefinable thing that an artist in any field .. music , painting, architecture, literature. .. brings that gives a sort of unique insight and nuance and color to things from their perspective that the audience hadn’t yet thought of or felt exactly so.

OK.. that’s Tom22 philosophy for the day.
Bottom line, I liked the voice..
There were some good performers in the final 6 and I don’t care how they finished in order.
I do think that the finalists were all deserving of recognition and that the winner is a special enough artist to deserve good things coming her way - (I don’t need to say she’s better.. I would have been happy enough with most of the finalists – I abstained from voting because, well I probably felt like she deserved to win but didn’t want to vote against Nicholas. Lol ) .. I’ve been listening to Melanie.. but that doesn’t mean I think she deserved to win.. just that I like listening to her performances NOW.. not that I think they were better... actually I think Cassadees were better .. I just get enough of those songs more quickly.