I hope Phillip is doing well and I wish him the best of health. I’m so thrilled that Phillip will be able to join the tour from the start because how can the Idol Tour be completely exciting w/o its amazingly charismatic winner!!

I wish Phillip well and I am happy they found a treatment that would be less invasive. I suspect being “congenital” it will be a lifelong battle. I believe nearly losing Phillip as a baby gives the Phillips a far different perspective on the situation than Idol Fans and know what is right for their son. Fingers crossed he will remain healthy into September. I have tickets this year.

Reminder:

META discussion about who posts here? ONE HUNDRED PERCENT OFF TOPIC.

For some it will always be about singing a song note for note, breath for breath, emotion for emotion as it was originally written or sung.  But, ya know, I think some of us like the fact that an “entertainer” can sit the “world” on its ear and make something pretty enjoyable and “listenable” after  manipulating a songs melody or even hashing the notes to come up with something surprising and unique.  And I never thought that Phillip had “difficulty following a melody”…I think he twisted it and wrung it on purpose to fit his interpretation and style.  Mimicry is not my favorite form of musical interpretation….I don’t want to hear every cover sound just alike.  That, to me, has nothing to do with being a good performer or entertainer.  It just means someone has a good ear and not much more.

Well, I guess that’s where the personal preferences thing comes in. I loved most of what he did. :) I’d never heard “Volcano” or “The Stone” before, and wow!

But then, I really like people who take creative chances. Yeah, sometimes it doesn’t work, but when it does, you get gold – or maybe platinum. :)

And I never thought that Phillip had “difficulty following a melody”…I
think he twisted it and wrung it on purpose to fit his interpretation
and style.

For whatever reason, P2 tends to take that approach too far, IMO.  While it’s great for singers to stamp their own style on songs, outright disrespect of them as written goes beyond a cardinal rule in music.  Even jazz artists, who often take the greatest liberties with songs, tend to perform them fairly straight at least the first time through.  But when the performance of a song doesn’t bear even the remotest connection to its original music, the singer may as well be singing something else.

Oh I don’t know that it’s really necessary to stick to the exact melody in order to respect the original song. It’s possible to make some drastic changes putting your own spin on a tune and still honor the meaning of the song. Or heck, even put a spin on the meaning altogether. It may not go over well with big fans of the original song, but if it does in fact sound good that’s all that really matters.

I think people were tough on Phillip to begin with because he did it so often that many assumed that he simply wasn’t able to sing the melody, vocally. And that’s a tough pill to swallow while watching a singing competition. But enough people liked the sound of what he was doing to keep him in the competition long enough for him to show with some songs that he could stick to the melody. And in those last couple weeks, the songs with his own more creative spin were really appealing. He peaked at exactly the right time.

“For some it will always be about singing a song note for note, breath
for breath, emotion for emotion as it was originally written or sung.”

Yes, for some people, they may prefer a rendition of a song close to the original, but that is not what I was referring to. It’s not so black and white, and there’s a huge range between simple mimicry (karaoke), and a new rendition/arrangement of a popular song.

Pitchiness isn’t a matter of personal taste, it’s objective. The degree to which someone can like/tolerate a pitchy singer varies, but that doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that they are off key, as we’ve discussed before. If people like frequently pitchy singers, that’s their prerogative, but it’s a futile argument to claim that they are not off key. P2′s pitchiness was particularly exposed during his duet with John Fogerty. This also impacts the ability of a singer to follow a melody. From what I saw on Idol, P2 mangled his songs because he had difficulty following an established melody (which he tried a couple of times), and it was a way for him to sing without exposing that weakness in an obvious way.

Also, I’m all for a singer making changes in a song in the interest of “making it their own” or interpreting it in an interesting way, but when the song is literally unrecognizable, then that’s a different matter. Again, some people may not care that the song bares no resemblance to the original (that’s where personal taste comes in), but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s been mangled into something that can’t be recognized.

larc wrote:

“For whatever reason, P2 tends to take that approach too far, IMO.  While
it’s great for singers to stamp their own style on songs, outright
disrespect of them as written goes beyond a cardinal rule in music. 
Even jazz artists, who often take the greatest liberties with songs,
tend to perform them fairly straight at least the first time through. 
But when the performance of a song doesn’t bear even the remotest
connection to its original music, the singer may as well be singing
something else.”

Yes, I agree. I’m a fan of many jazz artists who, despite improvising extensively in performing/singing songs, never lose the connection to the original melody.

It will be interesting to see how much input P2 has into his debut album and singles. Even if he is allowed to record his own compositions, I wouldn’t be surprised if he were matched with established songwriters to help “tweak” them. Or, Interscope could try the “Bowersox approach”, where they could save a lot of money by letting P2 record his own songs and see what happens.

“It’s really no mystery. It comes from listening and recognizing that P2 is frequently pitchy and has difficulty following a melody. Not to mention mangling well-known songs until they are unrecognizable.”

That’s it, in a nutshell, fuzzywuzzy. For people who cringe at off-key (and not everyone does) – Phillip may be better off with originals…no one has any idea of what they are supposed to sound like.The tune can be accepted or rejected on its own merit, with the notes he intended it to have, and not compared to a singer with a better tone and wider range. I did not enjoy the aforementioned mangling on Idol, listening to him/watching him on the show, I don’t like his Coronary, which sounds just like the original, and I have no interest in his future music – so it’s academic to me. Personal preference.

But Tess, I respectfully submit that you are using a false dichotomy. Between mimicry and note hashing, there’s a lot of choices…even though Phillip doesn’t make them.

If I were a fan of “…a song note for note, breath for breath, emotion for emotion as it was originally written or sung.”, then I may have liked his Coronary, or the cover of Damien Rice’s “Volcano” – copied right down to the staging and the co-singer. But I’ll agree – ” Mimicry is not my favorite form of musical interpretation.” It isn’t even a form of interpretation, by definition. And Damien sounded better. IMO.

The point in a cover, for me, is to show the listener something different about the song. Interpretation is more than “twisting and mangling” notes – it can be accomplished with tone, tempo and intonation, singing from a different POV from the original, and using a few note changes to emphasize that difference, which completely change the ‘vibe’. The melody does not have to be a casualty in the process. That’s not what he is doing…I learned no new truths about those songs.

And when Phillip said he sang the melody of “Why Don’t You Stay” to show that he could – he actually couldn’t. So there is nothing musically to recommend him to me. But, that’s Just My Opinion, and my personal taste.

I’m not a barbarian, I hope his medical issues are resolved so he can enjoy some of the crazy year that’s coming up – and deal with the grueling schedule. Maybe he writes great music he can deliver on key, live, maybe he’s a killer lyricist, and writes amazing hooks for radio consumption that delve into the human condition, I don’t know – and the odds of his Label giving him free rein are small. I wish him good fortune in negotiations – and a not too unhappy experience in the art of compromise, as he is now an American Idol statistic.

Hmmmm he must be smoking some weed HAHA.  seriously, i wouldnt be surprised.

Phillip still seems to think he’s having surgery, according to this interview with a Boston radio station. Maybe TPTB didn’t tell him that he’s getting the “alternative” treatment. (also, album set for November).

http://mix1041.cbslocal.com/2012/06/05/phillip-phillips-album-drops-in-november/