Front Row Dress Circle

More to the point, is Susan herself starting to unravel…?

Those close to the ‘unkissed’ Susan claim that her two recent public rages were down to the increasing pressure on her. Susan, in front of a roomful of people at her London hotel, swore at the tv and gestured rudely at it when she was part of a crowd of 150 people watching the recent semi-final of Britain’s Got Talent.

When Piers Morgan lavishly praised 12 year old singer, Shaheen, she shouted “F*** off!” at the tv, rudely gestured and then stormed off to her room.

It is well known that Susan has a strong crush on judge Piers Morgan and her unattractive reaction to his praising a rival contestant left witnesses stunned. Yesterday after yet another incident at the hotel saw Susan spouting four-letter words at a policeman people are now starting to ask if all the pressure is getting to the woman?

I would say it most certainly would be, and if so I feel very sorry for her.

This is a woman who has led a rather sheltered life in a small village – little education and by her own admission ‘learning difficulties’ stemming from what was a traumatic birth 48 years ago. Not much is actually known about her other than she has ‘never been kissed’ and sings in a church choir. What is known though is she has become a world-wide phenomenon, the most viewed person on YouTube and, on a more slightly sinister note, she has a strong crush on Piers Morgan which is coming across as increasingly obsessive. Hence her bad tempered response to his telling Shaheen that he was the best singer yet in the semi-finals.

Up until recently it was un-PC to criticise ‘SuBo’ in any way – do so and you had a ton of bricks rain down on you. But this is changing; fellow contestants in the show are reporting her extreme ‘moodiness’ (she is Scottish after all…) and increasing bizarre behaviour. Members of the public are now seeing a side to Susan that none of us believed existed just a week ago – she was a breath of fresh air, a naive and sweet ingenue who was the epitome of the unfulfilled dream come true. But this ingenue swears like a trooper and has a fuse shorter than a firecracker…

The reality is that a simple soul – an unsophisticated and childlike woman blessed with an incredible voice – was plucked from her safe, secure little corner of obscurity and dropped right into the middle of the world spotlight. She has neither the guile nor the steely constitution to deal with the pressure of this sudden and intense intrusion into her life. The little home in Blackburn has protected and cushioned Susan from the harsher realities of life of which she had a taste in her school days; what a shame that the one blessing she has, her voice, could prove to be a curse.

We all know how fickle the media and public can be – her rise to fame has been swift, her fall from it could be even more so.

Popularity: 15% [?]

If there is one thing about the semi-finals of a competition such as this, it is that it sorts the true talent from the flukes. Quite a few flukes managed to get through the first round of auditions and be chosen – some of them were seen last night.

I was not a fan of Sue Son first time around and last night’s perfomance convinced me why; the mini-skirt gimmick has been done to death by young female violinists and proved that appealing to the ear is more important than the eye where the violin is concerned. She was terrible; she looked very awkward and her intonation was not spot on – a very unsettled performance.

Diversity were brilliant; I am not usually enthused by dance acts but they were very original and entertaining, as were Faces of Disco. Young Natalie Okri just looked lost to me during her performance and to see her devastation when the judges chose Diversity over her for the final made for uncomfortable viewing. It reminded me of when young boy soprano, Andrew Johnston, lost in the final last year – such a huge public rejection for one so young; I feel she should have had a mentor of some kind standing with her at that stage because she just looked so alone. She could be very good indeed but she needs to move away from the ‘dancing in front of the bedroom mirror’ style.

The other acts fall into the ‘fluke’ category for me but not, of course, Susan Boyle. She was obviously a bundle of nerves and was the reason why her voice cracked on the opening notes and in other places during the song. Her ‘makeover’ has certainly transformed the way she looks (new upper teeth veneers being the latest improvement, I wonder if weight loss pills will be foisted on her next…) but I felt she was a little uncomfortable. She gave a very good rendition though of the song ‘Memory’ which is not an easy song to sing – I wonder if it was her choice…

There is no doubt though that the public have already chosen their winner and even though there are some great acts to come I would be very surprised if Susan does not win next Saturday’s final. The thing with Susan is she really cannot get any better than she is now, only more famous…but she sure is making a lot of people very happy in what are grim times. And we need people like this.

Popularity: 14% [?]

I can remember the very first time I heard what seemed to me to be the voice of god. I was listening to a Classic FM station at home in Sydney and the announcer played a track from a 1976 recording of ‘Tosca’. It was conducted by Sir Colin Davis – the track was ‘E lucevan le stelle’ and the singer was Jose Carreras. I don’t know if it is possible to fall in love through a song but I fell pretty darn hard!

I was hooked. That was just prior to the famous 1990 World Cup concert at Caracalla in Rome by The Three Tenors so by the time I sat down to watch the video soon after (the concert was not shown live at the time in Australia) I had become something of a Carreras nut. Sure he was a little greyer and a few years older than on the cover of that 1976 recording of Tosca but to me he was still pretty darn hot for an opera singer. The Three Tenors made opera ‘cool’ as it so deserved to be and placed opera right up there with U2, Madonna and every other major rock and pop star at that time. Who would have thought that three men over 50 and wearing tuxedos could have gone right to the top of the charts ?

Jose was my favourite – everyone had their own particular tenor they preferred – and I built up a sizeable collection of his operas and recordings, concerts on video (remember those) and lapped up anything I could find out about him. If there was such a thing as an ‘opera groupie’ then I easily could have become one…

In 1991 my prayers were answered when he came out to Australia and I took Mum and her sister along to see him perform at the Sydney Entertainment Centre – we were like excited teenagers – we saw him again in 1994 when he returned. Opera buffs and self-proclaimed experts the world over often argued over who of the ‘Big Three’ was the better singer and it was an argument which really had no answer; Domingo, Pavarotti and Jose each had their own unique qualities. No doubt Jose’s voice has a ‘before the illness and after the illness’ aspect but even still the quality and passion that define his voice was never affected.

I love to listen to that ’76 Tosca – it is my favourite opera recording and I defy anyone to listen to the voice of that handsome young Catalan man singing in his prime and not feel shivers down their spine. The other night Jose was honoured at the Classical Brit Awards with a Lifetime Achievment Award, as he is about to retire from the world of opera performance (not from singing though) it could not have come at a more appropriate time. He helped take an art form that at one stage was the domain of the rich and cultivated, the fur coated ladies and champagne-toting men and placed it back within reach of the ordinary people, young and old. Back where it began and back where it definitely belongs.

Popularity: 19% [?]