Hidden Talent

[winston]

Well to be honest, this is not exactly rock and roll..................but what a talented lady. I could not believe my ears and neither could the judges.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

[libratune]

It won't play for me. I get the message "embedding disabled by request."

[cjj]

Me too...

[winston]

OK it should work now just follow the link.

[kiramdear]

Wow! Talk about a surprise. That was really moving. She reminds me of Julie Andrews.

[antipodean]

Great voice, fabulous delivery, perfect control - a great performance. Just shows that great talent is lurking amongst us, undiscovered.

The looks on the judges faces are priceless.

[brammy]

Brian.... I want to personally thank you for posting that. Simply wonderful (he said as he wiped away tears).

Hey. I've go hidden talent too. The problem is that I've never been able to find the little bast*rd.... hmmm he must be around here somewhere.... I'll just keep looking - and in the end, THAT is the most important thing.

[brammy]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/abr ... y_id=38580

Susan Boyle: Just Who Is The Singer Susan Boyle?

Unless you live under a rock, you know about the Scottish woman who has taken the industrialized World by storm: Susan Boyle.

Ms. Boyle, who appeared on a reality TV show called "Britains' Got Talent" last Saturday, April 11th and wowed a cynical audience and the judges, including the irascible Simon Cowell (also of American Idol) with her powerful performance of "I Dream A Dream" from Les Miserable has took the World by Internet storm.

What surprised millions - and does not make a great statement about our World industrial culture but is a great example of the power of online video distribution as the video has been seen over 15.9 million times on YouTube (I counted over 10 videos with over 200,000 views) as of this writing - is that someone who looks like her could sing like that.

But who Susan Boyle is as a person is a story of a good simple woman winning over a bad, complicated society. Ms. Boyle is 48 years old, unemployed, and she says never married or "kissed" which means she's a virgin. I do not laugh here because I think of her more as pure rather than question anyone's desire for her or perceived lack of same.

The Worldwide sensation lives in her childhood home in West Lothian, one of 32 council areas in Scotland, and which has Grapevine, Texas as its sister city according to Wikipedia, meaning they can claim her too.

Ms. Boyle cared for her mother until the elder Boyle's passing in 2007 at the age of 91; her father passed away 10 years before. Living alone, Susan attends church each weekend and it was there that her singing talent developed, and where her late mother encouraged her to sing, but Boyle had reportedly stopped singing and did not know how she would do on that Saturday night she shocked the World.

Susan's life has not been one without pain. Sadly, she was abused and starved of oxygen at birth and has a learning disability because of the act. Ms. Boyle says she was teased by classmates, and reportedly the scars of their comments remain to this day.

What I identify with about Ms. Boyle is, I myself having lost two fathers (my stepfather and my biological dad) to prostate cancer in 2005, and the same year my Mom was diagnosed with breast cancer (she's still with me), one becomes painfully aware of their own mortality, that of others, and the desire to "make one's mark" becomes ever intense. Susan Boyle's stirring song was as much a testimate to the power of the human sprit and a form of grieving as it was a display of talent. Susan wanted to make her mom smile, but in doing so made mothers all over the World smile -- my Mom called and said Boyle was the next Julie Andrews.

So, in a World of nasty pirates, mean internet commenters, and crazy right-wing extremists, we have to stop and embrace Susan Boyle for making us smile.

[winston]

You are welcome Kent.

Here is the star of the video and the competition.

[kiramdear]

Here's Susan on CBS Early Show this morning:

http://watching-tv.ew.com/2009/04/susan-boyle-cbs.html

I think she's my new idol.

[captsandwich]

Why would the judges on this show be surprised by this?
I guess they didn't learn their lesson the first time with the tenor, Paul Potts.
Granted, he had a singing resume of sorts and wasn't quite as socially awkward as Susan Boyle, but still, they shouldn't have been so blindsided.

[kiramdear]

Why would the judges on this show be surprised by this?

Everyone was floored for the same reason - me too: their prejudice led them to expect only comedy relief from her audition. The disgust and cynicism was written all over their faces as she introduced herself, and this is true for the audience too. "Frumpy old cat lady wants to be a pop star, yeah right". That's what everyone was thinking. The good thing was that everyone was delighted immediately to find out they were wrong.

I love her. She's the Sister Wendy of pop singers.

[cjj]

She's fantastic!

Reminds me of a similar situation where someone's speaking voice and singing voice are worlds apart, Jim Nabors. Who'da thunk Gomer Pyle could sing?

[brammy]

http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/200 ... -21283622/
Good for HER!
Having said that, it does look like she's colored her hair. A positive change to be sure.

[kiramdear]

I don't find that she's unattractive at all. She just looks like ladies from that part of the world, modest, healthy and unpretentious. An afternoon at the beauty shop and a shopping spree is all she needs to be as glamorous as she needs to be, IMHO. No one said Pavarotti should go on a diet or get his face changed, so if she's comfortable with herself why would I suggest to go under the knife or worry about her figure? Nah, just let her think about her singing, please. All this kind of personal critique from the journalists is the kind of thing that drives artists crazy.