The Voice 26: Cameron Wright and Cassidy Lee’s Unusual Pairing Results in a Steal
The Voice Season 26 Battles came to an end on Monday night (Nov 4) with a few interesting battles of which two resulted in steals. The final battle, between two Team Michael Buble singers, Cameron Wright and Cassidy Lee, ended with a dramatic steal.
Michael continued with his tendency to pick very different singers for pairings. Cassidy the rocker, fought the theatrical and soulful Cameron. He asks the two singers what happened since auditions.
Michael explained that he paired the two together due to their versatility and power. He picked “Hero” by Mariah Carey for the two. This one definitely favors Cameron’s style more.
Cameron relived their 4-chair showstopping audition. Michael was the only coach who turned for Cassidy, and he noted how special her grit is. He advised her to be herself and to not do runs on the song. He also suggested she be more than a musician. Cassidy connected to the song as she lost her dad in 2017, and described her mom is the “strongest woman ever.”
He wanted Cameron to open their eyes and connect. Cameron related to the song as they said they grew up queer in a Christian environment and that they were always bold. The two work on harmonizing and making their very different styles work together.
Michael continued so make out-of-the-box song choices that didn’t make sense
For some reason, none of Michael’s song choices seem to truly make sense for the singers. But either way the singers tend to make the best of them and that is the case here. Cameron began the song with a soulful tone hitting a few nice runs. Cassidy brought the grit with a slight nasal quality with her voice feeling very ‘70s influenced. Cameron did some vocal acrobats as the song continued. Cameron is likely the stronger vocalist when it comes to range and overall technique. But Cassidy seemed to make the song her own and I felt more emotionally connected to her, so I would lean towards her. Both do an excellent job though. It still felt a bit like two individual performances rather than a cohesive duet due to the two having very different songs and the song not exactly allowing them to meld together.
Snoop Dogg felt Cameron let it grow by not starting off super big and that Cassidy let it grow by eventually going big. Reba McEntire called Cameron a “powerhouse” and said Cassidy’s take “felt safe, it felt comforting.” For those reasons, she would pick Cassidy. Gwen was impressed by Cassidy making the song work as it felt so different, and added that Cameron “just snapped” during the latter half. She would pick Cameron. Michael thought Cassidy “crushed it,” noting how much he loved her growl. He said Cameron has the “ability to do all the runs,” but appreciated that Cameron settled down.
Reba McEntire stole the losing artist
Michael chose Cameron to move on. Reba stole Cassidy, as she appreciated how Cassidy stayed true to herself.
Other singers that shined during the episode included Team Reba’s country singer Katie O who beat trio 323 in a battle of “Lonesome Loser” and Team Gwen’s Camryn Brooks who beat Rowdy Shea with a performance of one of the top hits of the year, “I Remember Everything” by Zach Bryan and Kacey Musgraves.
Knockouts begin on Monday Nov 11, and hopefully we get some standout performances there. It’ll be interesting to see if the trend of out-of-box song choices continues.
