Canadian Idol competitors performed songs made popular by Canadian recording legend Anne Murray on Monday, August 25th. Prior to Monday night's performances, the Idols had a chance to audition in front of Anne Murray, and to receive some valuable advice.
"This guitar, this is a part of you, isn't it?" Murray asked Collingwood's Drew Wright. "You play it very well by the way. But I'm hearing a lot of bending of notes ... your vocals were going with the guitar. Make the guitar playing a little bit simpler and you just focus on that vocal first and foremost." Terrific advice from one of the world's true superstars.
Murray thought that Drew was making things more difficult by making his performances too complicated. "He's so musical, he's trying to do it all, he's trying to do too much but I think he should concentrate on his vocals and make those the best they can be," Murray said.
Drew chose to perform his rendition of Anne Murray's "Hey Daddy (Hippo in My Tub)" from a children's album recorded by Anne Murray in 1977.
It was one of, if not Drew's strongest performance of the competition, and the judges liked it.
Farley Flex was the first judge to applaud Drew's performance. "I gotta tell you Drew, I thought vocally that was your best performance yet. You were so clear, so concise, a really good song choice, and you looked really comfortable. The advice you were given you took it to heart. Really, really nice performance," Flex said.
It seems as though Idol Judge Zack Werner has finally warmed up to Drew's perforamnces. He said that he thought that Drew had turned a huge corner the last two weeks because he's singing songs with strong melody and therefore he sounds great in doing so.
Idol Judge Jake Gold was impressed with Drew's singing. "By far the best singing you've ever done on this show by a mile, good work," he said.
Idol Judge Sass Jordan applauded Drew's performance, and wondered outloud "if anyone ever told him he's a really good singer."
Drew Wright's second song of the night was John Mayer's "Gravity," and it received mixed reviews from the judges.
Judge Farley Flex said that he appreciated the vocal. "It came off as a little lighter shade of the blues in terms of the intensity but I thought you did a good job vocally based on what you normally do so it was really cool and obviously with the guitar you always make it happen so that was a reasonably good performance," he said.
Judge Zack Werner on the otherhand didn't like the performance and wondered why Drew wouldn't continue to take the advice he had received earlier from Anne Murray. "The world can change with one song but not with that one." Werner said.
Next week, the Idols will work with Canadian rock superstar Bryan Adams.
Wright will continue to live in the Idol Mansion while he prepares further performance material. Click here to visit the Idol Mansion on CTV's Canadian Idol web site.
