Canadian Idol, Big Tweaks! Are the American Idol Producers Taking Notes?
Those crafty and always-ahead-of-the-curve producers of Canadian Idol have introduced some huge tweaks to the show for Season 6. The first change had online auditions become part of the process of the nationwide search. One of those online auditioners, Gary Morissette, made the Top 24. And speaking of the Top 24, that’s new this year too. In the past, CI had a Top 22, evenly split between girls and boys.
But wait, there’s more. Not only is there a Top 24, but the gender split is not equal! Fifteen boys and 9 girls made the cut. Of course this changes how the semi’s will play out. The two nights of performances will not separate the boys from the girls, but mix everyone one up. The cast will be split into two groups, each group auditioning on different nights. Additionally, the groups will be different from week to week. Of course, the producers hope to keep the lists a secret. As if! Heh.
Not a given? The number of contestants to be eliminated could be different from week to week.
It certainly mixes things up in an interesting way, don’t you think?
The producers claim that more boys (and older boys) auditioned than girls this year, hence the uneven gender split. Hm. Not buying that exactly. I’m thinking the producers know that talented boys capture the imaginations of the viewers more so than talented girls. Think of the AI seasons that were light on boy talent–AI 3 and AI 6–least popular seasons of AI evah–at least as far as internet buzz and the stalwart AI fans were concerned. It’s all about the ratings, and it appears that the CI producers felt that major changes were necessary to keep things fresh.
American Idol producers have been known to follow the lead of Canadian Idol, allowing contestants to play instruments, for instance. Are the AI producers watching and taking notes? We’ll see come next year.
Source: Jam!
The Canadian Idol Semi-final round lasts 3 weeks and begins tonight on CTV, and continues tomorrow night. The results show airs Thursday night. Check the blog for Video of each episode at around 10 pm ET.
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8 Responses to “Canadian Idol, Big Tweaks! Are the American Idol Producers Taking Notes?”
The boy/girl split has been my biggest gripe about AI. There have
been so many boys that went home early and many girls who have stayed longer than they should have *cough* KristyLee *cough* from trying to keep it equal. I vote for change!
I think it wasn’t as bad this year though. I think season 6 was more the year that had guys that should have stayed and I’ll never forget Judd! *sniff*
I absolutely love the numbers of males and females not being even. I think that is the most arbitrary split and it accomplishes nothing good. Just choose the best singers – no matter the gender – up to the number you want.
It would surprise me if they went with the online auditions, although it would be a way they could cut down on those deadly weeks of audition shows. Just put them online and let everyone watch and comment, if they so desire.
I love these changes that CI has made and sincerely hope that AI gives them due consideration. As far as the online auditions go, CI allowed them but only 1 made it into the Top 24. It isn’t a replacement for the audition process, just an addition. I think it’s great as long as it doesn’t go too far. The arbitrary even split by gender instead of talent has always been one of my pet peeves. I do hope that AI makes this change, at the very least.
I think the whole not knowing how many people will be voted off thing is just because CI isn’t as popular in Canada as AI is in the US, so they only do a top 10 every year. Their ratings are only ranging from 1 to 5 million, on a good night.
I may sound looney but I’m going to give my opinion anyway.
I have done NO research on the subject, but I do wonder if there’s certain nights where people watch more TV than others.
i.e., Are there more people who watch TV on Tuesday night vs. Wednesday? Are there other shows on one of those nights that *might* draw people away from Idol?
If you mixed the groups randomly, and kicked off X number of people with the lowest votes, that would give an unfair advantage to the “more watched” group. I think that’s how they justify it now….boys and girls are 2 separate groups until top 12. It doesn’t matter if one group is more watched or gets more votes than the other, because it’s not looked at as an entire group of 24/20/16.
That said, I can’t think of a good solution.
And, I probably made no sense whatsoever. Hopefully someone understands my point!
Don’t forget the population of Canada is only about 1/10 that of the United States, so if Canadian Idol is drawing 3 million (like it did for last year’s finale), that is like American Idol drawing about 30 million. Also it airs in the summer, when fewer people are watching television in general.
CI allowed the contestants to play instruments starting with season 2. Not during their solos,but, during the group numbers. Thankfully, AI adopted this, as it added a much needed dimension to the show. AI used to have an uneven number of boys/girls when they had the 4 groups, made up of 8 people. The audience voted them into the top 12, and, that was when they had the wildcards. They stopped that after season 3, because the audience put John Stevens through. Not sure if this was the reason or not, but, I tend to think it was.
I don’t think it was. That was a weak year overall, and John was actually the 2nd highest finishing guy. Under the current format, I believe he still would have made the top 12.