A standard reality show beginning for last night's Celebrity Duets, as host Wayne Brady greets us with a smile and a recap from last week's show, including the judges bumping off of our first non-celebrity singer, Chris Jericho. We say hello to our celebrity panelists, Marie Osmond, Little Richard, and David Foster, and are reminded that starting this week, we are now the ones holding the fate of our non-celeb singers in our our dialing fingers and that voting will open at the end of the show.
Before we get into the line-up, let me tell you a bit about what I look for, besides singing ability and whether the singers know the song. Are they playing attention to the story of the lyrics... telling us the story and making us feel it? Are they at ease on stage and/or with the audience? Scared to death or having fun? And in this case, since it is Celebrity Duets, how is the singer's interaction with their partner? Oh — the most important of all and my highest accolade — the chill factor, something that doesn't happen very often, but when that feeling strikes, I know that a performance has it all goin' on!!
And here's how it played out:
Hal Sparks/Wynonna: In the pre-sing interview, Hal says he knows he needs to kick it up. A slow quiet start kicking into high gear as he poured on the emotion. Good harmonizing between him and W — the little snuggle and kiss didn't hurt. Judges were into it, too.
Lea Thompson/Belinda Carlisle (who was nearly unrecognizable to someone remembering the wayback days when the Go-Go's played underground clubs in L.A. and could hardly hold their instruments): Lea has a good enough voice, but the harmonies just weren't working for me, although Belinda said afterwards she thought they were great. I thought it was a bit of a flat performance all around.
Cheech Marin/Clint Black: Cheech doesn't have a strong vocal ability but it's pleasant enough. Plus, he looks like he's having fun and that gets points with me. David Foster thought it sub-par and as the audience started to boo him, Wayne Brady suavely stepped in and reminded us that we could make Foster eat his words by voting, thus proving him wrong.
Article comments
1 - JoAnna
I think Carly sucks! I think that she totally ruined Jesse McCartney's Song! She really deserves to go! She is the worst singer on earth!