American idol aint nothin but a...

So one of my guilty pleasures is American Idol. You always hear the judges talking about wanting to see who the contestants are as an artist. They say they want to hear songs that are current, or at least sung in a current way. They want to hear the music from the contestant that could end up being a hit on their solo record. So many things come to mind as this relates to the context of music. I'll just pick one, and try to go with it.

There was one night when the contestants were asked to pick an Elvis song. THE KING. I mean, how can you go wrong. Each picked a song that they wanted to sing, and did the best rendition of it that they could. Many of them were criticized because the judges felt that they did an outdated version of the song, that it wasn't current. My immediate answer to that is, they should have had them pick songs from a current artist if they wanted it to be current. But I get it. Take the song and make it your own. Give it a current feel. Make it relevant to the times.

So lets take it back to the original popularity of the song. What was it about the song that made it so popular when it first came out. Obviously, it wasn't the song itself, because if the song was just so amazing, then it would transcend the time, and it would work on American Idol. I think it is a number of factors. One is that it was a new kind of music. Well, at least new to the popular culture. They had been played by other artists in black clubs for years. Elvis just made them crossover hits. The young white audience now had a style of music to call their own, and Elvis was the face of it. Another factor could be that Elvis was a new, provocative artist who pushed the boundaries of what was being done in music. So anything that Elvis sang would be a hit, just as long as he was shaking his hips, smirking at the camera and singing provocative lyrics. Im sure that there are many other factors that played into why Elvis's songs were so popular, and someone who was alive and paying attention at the time could probably better speculate these reasons.

On a side note, I never really got the blues. I never understood why such simple songs were so damn popular. That is until I moved to Texas. I went to a little blues shack called TC's. The band was made up of some Texas blues musicians. Some young, some old. They rocked the house. I figured that this was as close to hearing the blues in the 50's as I was ever going to get. If I could go back to that blues shack every night of my life, it still wouldn't be enough. So once I heard the music in context, I got it.

Back to American Idol. If it isn't the song itself that makes it great, and it is more the context that surrounds the song, then how do you then take an outdated song and make it current? American Idol obviously isn't a hot sweaty blues bar deep in the heart of Texas (clap clap clap clap), it is a TV show in the 21st century that is trying to push modern music. Or in this case, push classic music in a modern way. So you have to find some sort of relevant context for the music. This could include different feels for the song, such as different beats and rhythms. There are ways that you could make more modern arrangements of the song. You could sing the song in the style of a modern singer like Alicia Keys or John Legend. You could search within yourself to find strengths that you have musically and base the song around that, like if you have an amazing range, you could start it low and build it up to a climactic high note. At the same time, I bet that if you completely changed the song from the original, the judges would criticize that.

I dont have the definitive answer on how it please the judges on American Idol. I just thought it was interesting that they picked songs because they are thought of as good songs, but then the contestants were criticized for singing it the way that Elvis popularized them.