American Idol Revisited

Hi Folks:

After a discussion last night with a dear friend about my initial blog entry, I have realized that the intent of my first entry may be misconstrued. Please read further for more clarification.

During my discussion I realized some of what I wrote earlier might seem overly harsh or punitive. This was not the intent.

My first goal was to communicate that people that have a dream of performing live for millions should have loving, nurturing advocates coaching them. Further these advocates should be setting the correct expectation for those trying to live their dream. Critiquing people in the manner Mr. Cowell does is one thing; a thing that I do not believe is a nurturing act. Those who are acting as advocates for their performers should take great pains to ensure their performer knows exactly what to expect when they enter the realm of performance competition. The coach/advocate should encourage them to reach for their goal; to strive to find their best voice. However, they should also be perfectly clear that this must be done over a period of time.

For the performer, learning and practice must occur and feedback must be given and truly internalized by the performer before they should believe they can do more than become fodder for a demeaning TV appearance. The advocate or coach should have the fortitude to tell the performer that their performance isn’t up to snuff, if this is indeed true. This would be doubly true when the performer is going to be compared to the best of more than 100,000 other performers.

It is true that a person may only want to appear on national TV, to have their 15 minutes of fame, if you will. If this is the performer’s sole reason for auditioning, then so be it. They have all the power in the world to audition. This doesn’t bother me at all.

However, when someone who clearly couldn’t make it past the first American Idol audition shows their complete disappointment and in some cases their complete and utter dismay when the judges provide a triple “No” assessment, I’m completely inclined to blame the people around them for setting them up for failure. Someone close to these dumbstruck people should have said “You are good, but I’m not sure your voice and stage presence is at the level needed to get past the first American Idol audition.” To me, staying silent when you know a person is going to get hurt is like saying: “Even though there are 99 out of 100 chambers that have a bullet, I think you should go ahead and try to beat the odds” when a person has a revolver pointed to their temple! Yes, they might beat the odds, but the result of not doing so can be catastrophic and the odds of a catastrophe are too high to hope the good outcome will occur. Why are we unable to competently help when providing the help simply requires we tell the truth in a loving and gentle way?

As children, we learned much from our parents or guardians by being told “No!” Many times we just accepted that our parents or guardians were looking out for our best interests. Other times this caused a big fit on our part, but we eventually understood that we had to abide by the restrictions of a wiser person. I can remember some of my fits from my younger years, which is why I’m convinced patience is one of the paramount requirements for raising a child. Many times we, as children, didn’t like these restrictions but we did acquiesce. Now remember, during our younger ages this corrective instruction was done in a very direct and over-bearing way. True. Love was generally the driver behind the admonition, but their stern direction was not cushioned by insulative words. As we grew, our parents or guardians realized that our higher cognitive functions were starting to develop and the softening words entered their admonitions more and more. When we reached adulthood many folks, including our parents or guardians, began to approach us as someone of equivalent emotional intelligence. This sequence describes how nurturing and loving protection occurred for many people in the first 16-25 years of their lives.

Sadly, I believe many of the examples we see of people who appear completely crushed when they fail to make it past audition #1 on American Idol have not had someone in their lives to help guide them to a proficient and skilled performance. To help someone develop into a brilliant performer, one has to give the performer true, actionable and nurturing guidance. One must tell the performer that learning and improvement never stop; that there is always one level higher that we must continue to strive for. This type of coach or advocate is what I believe is completely lacking for these crushed performers.

What is even more disturbing . . . I believe many are being guided by people that are doing the opposite of what I just said is needed. Over-sheltering a person or glossing-over a person’s development needs does them a disservice. When a person truly needs improvement but is told; “You are special! You are fantastic! I can’t imagine it being any better!” they are being set up for assured failure and disappointment. Why is this the case you ask? Simply because this well-meaning person has taken away the opportunity for the performer to learn or improve. Not only does this hurt the performer, but the over protective person suffers too. Imagine the performer finally meets someone that does give them honest and nurturing feedback, where do you think the performer’s trust level with the over protective person goes? If you guessed down the tubes, you are right.

Come on people! Let’s stop coddling our children and relatives that want to excel at an art or a sport. Let’s love them and provide them the right words to allow them to realize we would like them to reach their highest level of success, but let’s also let them know that it is a very rare thing to become a world-renown icon. Before you let your child audition for a play or for a musical competition, you must tell them that you truly hope they win. But this statement must be immediately followed up with something like: “As I have said, I hope you win. But please don’t think that winning this competition determines your value or determines the amount I love you. Judges are wrong all of the time and some are just plain prejudiced. Remember, we all have good days and we all have bad days. Let’s hope you get to have a good day during your competition and let’s hope the judges treat you fairly!”

Copyright JGR 2007, All rights reserved.