Committed

     The Finale is tonight (7:00-9:30 on NBC)! I've already voted and now the voting is closed but that is not going to stop me from writing about one last amazing group! So here we go...

     I give you Committed. I'm going to (try to) keep this post on the short side because I don't think there is anything I could say about these boys that won't smack you in face the second you hear them. However I will tell you that they came together in an Alabama church singing gospel and they have been pushing their own envelope on this show by consistently turning out some of the most inventive, expressive, and beautiful arrangements I've heard. I think that what really sets them apart (aside from their adorably sweet attitudes) is the richness of their harmonies and the raw talent throughout the group. Every single one of them is capable of singing lead because they were all blessed with gorgeous voices (voices "like butter" as Shawn Stockman of Boys II Men told them). Unlike some other groups who are obviously made up of divas trying to launch their solo careers *cough Backbeats cough*, these boys pass the glory around generously and when they're not singing the lead they take equal share in creating a strong, beautiful backdrop which enhances the lead even more. The degree of togetherness (for lack of a better word) both musically and emotionally is just astounding and it really shines through every one of their performances.

     On to the videos!

     I usually try to do these videos in the order they happened but if you only have the attention span to listen to one performance I want it to be this one, "Let's Stay Together" by the amazing Al Green.

     I'm sorry the quality of this video isn't top notch but I wanted to find one that included the judges comments. Ignore Nicole's crazy rambling about candy and listen to what Shawn Stockman and Ben Folds (a cappella and musicality experts respectively) have to say about this performance. I agree with them 100%. Other words that come to my mind after this performance are: seamless, smooth, sexy, expressive, honest, deep, etc. etc. Do you know how hard it is to swap the lead vocal line around like that? I remember many an arranging project in high school where two or more people really wanted to be the soloist and neither would step down. So they thought it would be a good idea to each sing a verse or two. Sure it sounds like a good solution but more often than not, when one person stopped singing the lead the other person would have to stop singing whatever back up part they were singing to step up leaving the previous soloist to pick up where they left off. This hardly ever worked because the person taking over the back up would wind up getting lost or coming in in the wrong place and dragging down the rest of the arrangement which would have been fine if one person or another had just learned the part and stuck with it for the whole piece. But the men of Committed make it look so easy! They switch off what, 10 times in the 2 minute song? And consider that since every one sang a lead that means they all had to not only know all of the lyrics but also at least two parts of the accompaniment, their own part and another part that they would have to fill wile its singer had the lead. Well done indeed!

     They broke onto the scene as top contenders on the first night of competition with Maroon 5's "This Love".

     Just watch the crowd's reaction at the end, I think that pretty much sums it up. I also loved seeing what Shawn Stockman thought of them ("musical orgasm" as one of the other judges put it). Obviously, being a part of the legendary Boys II Men makes him the authority on the a cappella portion of these performances and it is clear that Committed locked it in in his eyes. They were the last group to sing on the premier night and he told them that he had been waiting all night for a group to bring what they brought and I have to agree. I can't think of anything to add other than what Shawn already said but I would like to point out the delicious way that they picked one little moment in the piece and built up a luscious, flawless block chord harmony that just makes you say, "oh yes". 

     This is their "guilty pleasure" song (aka super cheesy but oh so catchy) "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys.

     In the little intro piece they use to fill up their two hour slot they talked about how strange they felt to be self-proclaimed "church boys" trying to be sexy. They showed a few of them singing a line or two while showing off their best sexy moves before cracking up with the rest of the group. Adorable. I hope they know that when they get back to church after all of this there are going to be a lot more girls in the congregation than they remember. This clip also includes the judges comments and I think they pretty much sum it all up. All I have to say about this performance is mad props for giving us all the cheesy goodness of the Backstreet Boys and throwing in a bonus of actual musicianship. Wow. Also, the boy band inspired dance moves were a nice touch too.

     Basically, I love their sound and they all seem like such sweet guys I just want to be their friend! They are the whole package and if they win you can be sure I will be buying that album.

    I want to wish good luck to all of these groups at tonight's Finale. They all deserve so much to win (except the fakey fakerson Backbeats who are less of a group and more 15 soloists who will eventually snap and kill each other in a fit of vanity if they have to work as a group for the many months it takes to create an album) and I truly hope that whoever doesn't win will have gained the attention they need to further their music careers from this show because I would love nothing more than to buy their albums. Did you hear that record companies of the world? There are people who will pay money to buy music by Street Corner Symphony, Committed, and Jerry Lawson and the Talk of the Town!

     In conclusion, thank you to all of the competing groups and NBC for the fun of The Sing Off.

Accappella or is it a capella, acapela... acappella?

   Aside from being really hard to spell, a cappella (that is the official spelling, I checked) is an amazing genre of music in which no instruments are used. It's all vocal. So that means when you're singing N*Sync in the shower you are singing a cappella... fancy huh? But hold on to your loofa (I did not check for the official spelling of that) because the genre goes so far beyond bad shower singing! There exist groups of people who are experts in this fine art. Such people create entire songs, both original pieces and covers of any song imaginable, in which the lyrics, guitar, bass, harmonies, percussion and any other sound you've ever heard in a song are all created using only their voices. Like anything else, there are a lot of good groups, a lot more really mediocre groups and a just a few truly amazing groups. I for one, would like to say thank you to the a cappella nerd over at NBC who has so kindly given us The Sing Off so we may marvel at groups from all of these categories (however we will only be discussing those in the amazing category). What's that? You haven't seen it? Well never fear, hulu has all the episodes and clips you need to get caught up.

*This is the part where you go watch a couple of videos if you have no idea what I'm talking about*

     Fun right? I bet a lot of you know that in high school I sang in a similar group (shout out to the 08-09 Angelaires!) We were 11-16 people throughout the year due to some freak vocal upsets and while we did a fair number of pop tunes we were mostly accapella jazz based. And to put it simply we just freaking rocked. The group has won top honors at jazz festivals all over the state (and occasionally elsewhere) for the past... I don't even know... a lot of years. And to be perfectly honest that was the most in touch and connected I have ever been able to feel with both the music I was singing and the people I was singing it with. Singing that particular music with that particular group really opened me up as a musician and a performer (Thanks Mr. Taylor). It is just a shame that we had such a short time together.

     In case you haven't caught on, I really miss that group. I miss the people, the music, the atmosphere, and just being a part of such a high caliber group. That is why I love The Sing Off. It allows me to relive my glory days vicariously through other accappella groups (do I sound like an old dude in a beat up la-z-boy reminiscing about some war or another? Oh well. Listen up Sonny!) Monday is the Finale where America gets to vote for the winners and I know that this blog has a lot of influence *Puffs out chest, puts hands on hips, and looks dramatically into the distance* so I thought I would do what I can to help you decide who to vote for.

   There are four groups who are still in the running to win the grand prize (which is some amount of money and a nice little recording contract). It all comes down to:

• Committed *swoon*
• Jerry Lawson and the Talk of the Town *awww*
• Street Corner Symphony *Rock on*
• The Backbeats *Booo!*

    I gotta say, I am so glad I'm not in charge of picking the winner here. The three groups that I like (I'm sure you've guessed who those are) I really like. I think every one of them is completely deserving of the prize and a further career in music. And honestly, even the group that I don't like is quite good and I'm sure that they would record a perfectly decent album if they won but they are just missing what I consider a really big element of a rock solid group (which I will discuss later) . For me there is a 3 in 4 chance that I will be really happy for the winning group but at the same time will feel really badly for the other 2. I would love to see them all gain the interest of recording companies through their stint on this show so that whether they win or lose they can still go on in music.

     In the interest of not writing a 14 page post that no one has the attention span for (like this one) I'm going to show you each of my favorite groups over the next 3 days (the last will be on Monday before the big Finale) in the hopes of sharing this awesome music with you... and maybe swaying you to vote with me in the process ;)

   Come back tomorrow!