Esther, Bame Pull Out Of Pop Idols

By Monkagedi Gaotlhobogwe
Correspondent | Monday April 16, 2007 00:00

 

They escaped miraculously the previous week after they were up for eviction. But you could still tell after their last performance that the couple would not survive the next elimination.  As expected, the couple received the least votes for the second week running. Their names were announced along side Michael and Kagiso, two of the shows' amazingly talented youngsters.

Esther and Bame's absence seemed to give the judges some headache as they fumbled for a while pondering what to do with the remaining duo.  They took long to decide who should go home that night.

With the couple gone, it becomes difficult to predict who would be next as it appears the 13 remaining musicians all have equal chances to go all the way. The likes of Melita Seabelo, Eunice and Kitso Selato, who started the show on a low-key, continue to surprise people.  Before Friday, Eunice would have been one of the obvious candidates but she came out of nowhere and put up a memorable performance.

After her rendition of Alicia Keys' 'If I aint got you,' Eunice left many wondering why he left it so late. She varied her pitches so well and was impressive with high notes, a thing she had not done in this show before. Gorata, on of the early lukewarm singers here, also put up a performance that puts her among the top three this week. She performed en Vogue's Don let go with pomp, although one of the judges, Master D Sesinyi, felt she should improve crowd communication.

Kagiso and Michael failed to get the audience clapping and waving, but they have shown in the past they can do better than that. Tshepo Dikomang, rated by judge DJ Sid as the best singer in the show, lived up to her billing, as she did Brandy's 'have you ever', so beautifully, causing the audience to come to life. The presenter of the show, Thabiso Nasha, liked the audience's response and wished they could clap like that for all the singers, but they told him it does not come so cheap.

Just when everyone was thinking this was the best performance of the night, the best was yet to come and it came from an unlikely source - Kitso. Who could have imagined that the boy would put up such a show as he did? After his performance, Kitso was not only congratulated by the audience but his fellow pop idols gave him a standing ovation. At the end of the show, the directors of the show replayed his performance and it was simply fantastic.

It was a night of excellent showing by many pop idols indeed and DJ Sid thought that perhaps the Esther break gave the singers ample time to work on their voices. Thandie Monageng, who usually thinks that DJ Sid is harsh on her, could not believe it when he gave her all the marks this time after she did Aroe Smith's I don't want to miss.

The charismatic Smar, who has made it a habit to take chairs to the stage, this time performed a Whitney Houston's Count on me, but he still has to show that he can sing different styles. He is great in his style, but what more can he show us? This is the challenge to any singer - people want to hear how versatile your vocals can be. DJ Sid challenged Tsholofelo Bayford, considered one of the best singers in the show, to show us next time what else she can do with her vocals. When Tshepo performed two Alicia Keys songs in a row, he challenged her to show  what else she could do and Tshepo responded well.