The Fredösphere

Alex Ross blogs a mobile phone salesman from South Wales named Paul Potts who brings "Nessun dorma" to Britain's Got Talent, a UK version of American Idol.  His back story has a hint of Cinderella in it, and he gives a spellbinding performance, although he enjoys an unfair advantage in that he gets to sing the greatest freeggin' love song that ever got wrote.  Plus, it's refreshing to see someone allowed on TV with ordinary good looks that haven't been surgically "perfected."

I must confess, however, to having a soft place in my heart for another amateur interpreter of Puccini, Stephen Miller.  Part of Stephen's charm is his approach to self-packaging, which, like Paul's, is not yet perfect.  (Hint to Stephen:  a few simple Photoshop commands can fix the red-eye and nasty aspect ratio issues in your thumbnail photo.)

Of the many permutations of Three Tenors, one that's new to me is the Three Redneck Tenors.  What's that, you ask?  Why, gosh darn it, yes -- they've got their own version of "Nessun dorma."  It's a little bit country, a little bit rock 'n' roll, a little bit bad, and it's just about the most toe-tappin', gooder-than-grits, and hotter-'n-a-goat's-butt-in-a-pepper-patch version of "Nessun dorma" I ever seen:  there's something about cummerbunds with mullets that's cuter 'n a sack full o' puppies.  They do Beethoven's 5th as well, which isn't quite as dreadful as it should be, although it suffers from the same problem as that of all musical jokes:  a punch line that lasts three minutes is never funny.

Labels: VideoClip, vocal