AMERICAN IDOL 2011

In 2011, American Idol celebrated their 10th year, however, this was the first year I watched the show. I certainly have plenty of shows to watch already, so I really didn’t need another show to occupy my time, but I was visiting my sister in Florida last February and this is a show she watches faithfully so I had no choice but to watch it. After a couple nights of watching these young people sing their hearts out, I was invested enough in the show to keep watching the rest of the season. Not having watched the previous seasons, I can’t say from past experience, but I think this year the final group consisted of extremely gifted and diverse singers. Of course the elimination process never goes the way we think it will and our favorite person is eliminated way too early. I think what intrigued me with the show was all the different types of music these contestants performed. Naima Adedapo, Thia Megia, Karen Rodriguez, and Ashthon Jones were not memorable contestants, as far as I was concerned, and placed 10th, 11th, 12th and 13th. Pia Toscano, who had an excellent voice and sang ballads, placed 9th but managed to get a recording contract immediately. Paul McDonald, who had a raspy voice similar to Rod Stewart, sang Rod’s hit songs. His voice wasn’t strong though and he placed 8th. Stephano Langone had a good voice although not as strong as the others. He sang various light rock songs and placed 7th. Casey Abrams was obviously an accomplished musician and played almost all the string instruments, sang Jazz and Blues and placed 6th. Jacob Lusk, who came from a church gospel choir group had an excellent, strong deep voice, sang Luther Vandross songs and placed 5th. James Durbin could belt out hard rock songs to the point of practically screaming while staying in tune and placed 4th. He has an album, Memories of a Beautiful Disaster, releasing in November. Haley Reinhart had an intoxicating raspy voice, who sang Blues and Jazz style songs, and placed 3rd. She received a recording contract shortly after the tour and will be releasing a CD soon. Lauren Alaina had a beautiful voice for the Country songs she sang and was the runner up. She released her debut album, Wildflower, a few months after the season finale. Scotty McCreery, who had an unbelievable deep country voice and of course sang Country songs, was the winner. He became the American Idol for 2011 and released his first album, Clear as Day. Since I became so invested in these people and especially loved Hailey’s version of, House of the Rising Sun, I just had to attend the concert in Minneapolis at the Target Center on August 3. I purchased my ticket late and because it had been sold out earlier, this newly available section was on the side of the stage. My seat was almost in the very last row and the seats in that area tend to be at a very steep angle which makes you feel like you could fall down at the slightest wrong step. Plus it tends to make me feel a little dizzy. It appeared they had only sold the first eight seats in each row, leaving six open seats in each row in both the top and bottom sections, so we moved down to the lower section and all was good. These ended up being excellent seats as the singers always walked to the end of the stage which faced us so they were standing only a few feet away. The concert was entertaining and the singing, of course, was top notch with all thirteen of the finalists performing. I’m not sure if I will ever attend another American Idol concert, but this one was definitely enjoyable and I look forward to buying Haley’s new upcoming CD, along with Pia’s and Scotty’s, too. I have great memories of the 2011 American Idol concert that will be remembered for a lifetime! Along with new songs on my IPOD! So you just never know what will happen by watching one episode of American Idol!