Here is some wonderful video I just found of Stevie backstage with the Idols, just foolinà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ and singinà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ together. Here weà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ve got the early, shy Kris, kind of on the sidelines but digginà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P4YvWMhsUU

As! My fave Stevie song w/ Anoop totally fanboying on vocals. Awesome!

And Kris kicking on the Beatles song. heh

Nice find!

None of those stars give a crap who won American Idol. They are making tons of money to be there with a smile. The world is not revolving around any of those contestants.

Yep, that about sums it up. Kris probably made $100K just to do what he did so I can’t imagine what the rest of them make. It’s a great perk for the A.I. winner to appear on these annual WalMart Shareholder’s meetings. Bigger named stars make at least $250K if not more. Laugh all way to the bank they do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-vCCpg0UbM

It’s a much better version of the Smokey Kris duet than I’ve seen elsewhere.

Wish Kris’s mike had been turned up (it’s one of the biggest corporations in the world, couldn’t Wal-Mart get a better sound person?) but it was so funky and fun. Loved seeing him swap phrases with Smokey, an entertainer that brings so much joy to his shows (not to mention a gazillion hit soul songs he wrote and/or recorded).

I think Kris is a pretty soulful dude, and I’d love to see him go in that direction. Nice memories of him grooving out to Stevie Wonder at the beginning of the AI season. Here is some wonderful video I just found of Stevie backstage with the Idols, just foolin’ and singin’ together. Here we’ve got the early, shy Kris, kind of on the sidelines but diggin’it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P4YvWMhsUU

I do think that backstory/frontstory mean something in Idol, but talent has to go with it. And personal backstory (widowhood, hurricanes, blindness) aren’t what I mean. It has to be a show-biz backstory!

Adam’s great backstory (beside all the silliness about his sexuality) was that mythic star-plucked-from-the-chorus saga, of a guy who’d worked so hard and finally got the break he richly deserved. Kris’s was the shy guy with great talent blossoming gradually before your eyes.

If they already know that their personal range is only an octave, and that the specific song they want to sing spans an octave PLUS 7 half steps, then they would be better off declining that offer because the song is going be entirely OUT of their comfort zone. Even lowering the whole song will not help here because the range of the song is outside of the singerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s personal range. This is why we hear so many sad renditions of The Star Spangled Bannerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬  at local sports events. The song has a larger range or à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“tessituraà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬  than the singerà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s.’”

Hey, I know it’s not the easiest song in the world!

But, for me, I can bet that it would be way way easier than something like “No Boundaries,” simply because it is melodic enough to allow you to just sing it in a relaxed, low-key manner if you’re willing to do that. No Boundaries simply doesn’t allow that, seems to me — you have to push and punch and wail on that one to make it sound even halfway decent. But you don’t have to do that with the anthem, unless you want to, is my point. It’s nice on its own. It allows you to do a credible — not great, just credible! — performance that’s very simple and not pushy or flashy but expresses the words.

Disclaimer: I’ve sung classical repertoire almost entirely and a lot of what I’ve sung is 20th-century, atonal stuff, stuff with no set meter, so my sense of what’s difficult is probably different from most people’s perceptions of that — I mean, maybe No Boundaries doesn’t seem tough to pop singers. Does to me, though! And since I’ve done so much stuff that has little conventional melody, a nice melodic 18th century tune seems less hard than some things. Plus, you get to sing into a mic, so you don’t have to try to project to the back end of the auditorium all on your own!

Anyway, I know that people say you have to really be able to hammer at those top notes in the anthem, but in my opinion you really don’t! Seems to me from my experience that if you simply are able to open your mouth and let the notes out clearly while giving a heartfelt reading of the lyrics, that’s enough. (Not great, not Whitney, but enough.)(I’ve done this myself, and I’ve advised others to do it, and it’s worked out okay — that’s all I can say. Granted, nobody was at an NBA final.)

On the issue of the range, well, truly, if you don’t have at least an octave and a half in easy notes to reach, you shouldn’t be on American Idol, should you? I have to say that this is one of my reservations about Kris –I don’t think he has a very big usable range when he is nervous or tired or whatever. I hear him straining high and low at times, though not always. I think he needs training so that he can reach his notes without doing that, but I know it’s also quite possible to compensate for the smaller range with songwriting skills and other stuff.

That said, if he relaxes and doesn’t try to do anything spectacular with it, I don’t see why he can’t do one of those low-key renditions of the anthem that really focus on the words and just simply sing it. You hear country singers do those a lot. And Kris is good at the heartfelt, and that’s what people want in the anthem, more than anything.

Having heard him say that he hasn’t sung it before concerns me a bit. You definitely need to have internalized the song to have a prayer of just relaxing into it and expressing it. We’ll see, I guess. One way or another, he’s going to be asked to sing the anthem plenty more times — that’s a big way for the Idols to get exposure, it seems — so he’d better learn to do it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHu2181pH60

The audio quality is better and the audience response is not muted like in the webcast.

Kris with Ben Stiller and CEO Walton, striking a pose:

Not that it really matters, but the Walmart exec in this video is CFO Tom Schoewe, who also did an American Idol spoof in the previous segment.

Kris’ mom mentioned that a guitar company was giving him guitars in an interview with a Little Rock radio station.

http://www.krisallenation.com/2009/06/kim-allen-radio-interview.html

This is a really good interview that provides a lot of insights into Kris’ character from the perspective of his mother. She tells the story about his marriage proposal to Katy (not exactly as he told Leno) and the story about his mission trip and guitar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhJi4m56GCk

Kris has also scored a sponsorship deal with a guitar company, according to the Little Rock paper.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-vCCpg0UbM

The video stream isn’t completely smooth. I tried capturing the feed multiple times and this is probably the best recording of the bunch.

Danny had some problems with his vocal chord after the Rock week, I think he did a very good job even with the vocal chord issue.

Kris is the AI winner and has ample time to prepare for this, I expect nothing less from him.

http://www.truveo.com/Elliott-Yamin-Richmond-Nascar/id/3912292074

I think this has to be the most nerve wracking thing these guys have to do – especially during the big games. I wouldn’t want to do it.

http://www.rickey.org/?p=17320

Chris Daughtry’s version is much better:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Be0hIL0r5Pw

I hope Kris does something similar to Marvin Gaye’s version, slow it down a bit…

Also, when Kris turned around in order to do his model pose, does he have chewing tabacco in his back pocket?

Isn’t there a wire coming out of his back pocket (loops down and then goes up the center of his back)? It’s probably some kind of receiver/battery pack for the monitor he was wearing when he was performing. Whatever.

And TKat, I think you might have posted in the wrong thread accidentally.

ETA:
I’d like to point out for everyone that there is a National Anthem thread posted. I think it’d be best for MJ if we kept discussion in this thread related to the Wal-Mart performances.

I think the best Idol contestantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s version of the NA is David Archuletaà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s. Not overdone with lots of extra vocal gymnastics and flourishes. Just a purely stunning, beautiful, pure, and flawless version. His voice is perfect for that song.

IMHO Kelly Game 4 NBA Final performance was great. And Adam’s homecoming SSB at Miramar was also great. Taylor Hick’s NBA performance was just OK and David Cook was so nervous it was hard for me to watch.

Also, Fantasia “knocked it out of the park” at the NY Yankees game.

Someone made the observation that it’s easier for women to sing the SSB and I think Whitney Houston did it as well as can be done. But many of the best performance I’ve seen have been classically trained tenors. I think the Marines must recruit them specifically to sing this because they alway have some amazing singer at Presidential events.

And to the singers who think “The Star Spangled Banner” is a easy song to sing, you must be really talented and should audition for American Idol. It is a really hard song to sing, it covers 19 steps from lowest to highest note. And you need to hit the high notes with some power or it has not impact.
This is from a very well respected vocal coach:

If they already know that their personal range is only an octave, and that the specific song they want to sing spans an octave PLUS 7 half steps, then they would be better off declining that offer because the song is going be entirely OUT of their comfort zone. Even lowering the whole song will not help here because the range of the song is outside of the singer’s personal range. This is why we hear so many sad renditions of The Star Spangled Banner” at local sports events. The song has a larger range or “tessitura” than the singer’s.

Kris did not win American Idol because of his great vocal range, power or control. He won because people like his vocal style and like him, as I do. But I also know a little bit about singing and I just don’t see this song as a great fit for him. Tempo, range, key etc. can all be measured exactly. According to Idol Ranges, Kris has an 11 Â ½ steps range Overall lowest : B2 Overall highest : A#4/Bb4 (B4 with his falsetto). I’m sure he’ll figure it out but there is reason to be worried for him. Take a lot at Danny’s SSB from his homecoming to see what I mean — it’s a very hard song to sing.

Here’s the link again, if anyone missed it earlier in the comments:

http://walmartstores.com/sites/shareholders/2009/

Click in the bar to get to different sections…but don’t try to drag.

Oh, and the 2 walmarts in every town thing? Not a joke in the larger Arkansas towns. : )

check the shake your booty down to the ground video.

CindyM Jun 5th, 2009 at 10:24 pm

Kris is getting the tabloid treatment now. I was at Target today and Kris is on the cover of The Globe tabloid with his picture and a headline about his marriage being in jeopardy. These tabloids are ridiculous. I guess any publicity is good publicity, right?

Yeah, his mom talked about this in a radio interview I listened to and said just how ridiculous this was.

But I do think he should stick with guitar and don’t dance much : stay away from boy band image as much as possible!

Kris looked pretty comfortable, not intimidated singing with a legend. But I wish he’d had let go and busted out some real dance moves!