I'm thinking not. She came in with a great deal of ability, and she's used that well, but she hasn't become significantly better.

But perhaps her fans think differently.

My honest opinion - Her performances went downhill from "Hangin on the Telephone", she picked herself back up again when she sang "Sweet Dreams". "Shout" & "Sing it back" were pretty good, but the rest were pretty unforgettable.
(I'm a fan btw)
Last edited by Mart_UK : 10-03-2005 at 19:02

I was thinking about this earlier. If she has I would say it is a great deal smaller than the others. Her best performances for me were her first two. All the others since then I have thought were "ok" but that is all. I think this has reflected on her popularity and it is beginning to wane a little bit. She will really need to give a good performance to get in the top two tonight.

No, I don't think she's made much progress at all

Hmm, it depends on the song. I thought she was far stronger on Sweet Dreams than anything before that - that was 'proper good'! I would say that her performances, along with almost everyone else's, have improved a lot as the confidence levels have gone up.

To be honest I can't see a huge general improvement in any of the people who are left apart from Reggie - and for him the only way was up (bless him)! They definitely worked wonders with Debra too.

I think Ade and Edith haven't improved and are just relying on what they brought with them, Kim has continued to improve all along, and Reggie made a big improvement on where he started but hasn't changed much recently.

I don't think Edith has imroved much, but then she started at a high level.

What she has done is given us a wider variety than anyone else, which has sometimes been great, sometimes not. Nonetheless, it's a brave thing to do.

Kim and Debra, though very good singers (probably better than Edith), are balladeers. When they have tried something more upbeat, it hasn't worked - Kim mostly because she moves so woodenly. Debra's version of "I Believe in You" was worth eviction for on it's own!

Reggie has improved from a terrible singer to a just about tolerable singer. Ade's shown no improvement in his singing at all, and is still there only because he's funny - which is fair enough!

i thought you defened the students,as you say it is for charity,ade has had a sore throat for days now,i bet you could not sing with no vioce,
edith had a bit of a cough and that is all we heard about for days,ade has done well to carry one imo,ade looked sad today,so dont say you defend them all you dont just edith.
practice what preach sweety.

Have any of them? Improvement to me is taking what you've learnt and applying those techniques yourself. The singers are still being told how to sing the songs, and different things to use on each line by the vocal coaches - so they haven't really improved imo.

I'm not sure she needed to. She was astonishingly good from the start.

Edith is being held aloft by the heat of unjustified hype. Her winning would be a scandal.

i agree ade or kim to win.

I think Edith improved the least out of all of them except for Adrian

This is a fun event for charity. How can you be so vitriolic?

I don't give a damn whether Edith has improved or not. There were three excellent singers in there: Kim Edith and Dawn, (with Debra not far behind). If you want improvement, you should all have voted to keep Jon Culshaw in.

I think that she has a very thin voice, and isnt a particularly good singer. Richard Parks on the other hand...

I think it's Kim who hasn't improved, she went in a good singer and will leave a good singer, after all she was trained in it beforehand.

I really wanted Reggie to win, now i want Edith!!

It's a personal opinion, live with it. You probably thought Nadia was "fabulous" in last year's BB too.
6 months on many people feel short-changed by that particular "worthy winner."

No I thought she was funny but definitely not fabulous. I preferred Michelle, though. Also the subject of a lot of abuse on this site.

I agree! Edith is an ok singer, but without the Radio One hype and promotion, which is a totally unfair advantage, but invariably to be expected from them, isn't really a credible new talent.

Sure, she can do sub Blondie performances and has a reasonable voice, but she isn't even vocally anywhere near the league of past FA students such as Carolynne, who have disappeared without a trace.

Kim has a nice vocal tone and is probably better than a lot of "top" pop singers today, but isn't that special, imo.

Her BTT song last night displayed great emotion, but it has to be remembered that the really difficult parts of the song were totally out of her vocal range and weren't even attempted very sensibly!

Part of it is format and tiredness. Live streaming tonight was interesting. All 4 solos in part 2 were better - Edith's explanation was that Cat questioning them just before and the thought of the judges after undermined everyone's performance and in the second half they could just go on and sing. Ade and Kim agreed. Ade thought you always forgot your song by the time you ended with Cat. they also discussed the schedule and thought they would all do better if less tired - the obvious tiring thing to cut was Kevin's class. If they get more tired you wouldn't expect much improvement - even less as they spread their time around more songs.

Not sure Edith isn't improving. Take out the inteview and judges and you get Edith doing shout tonight which was better than her first effort at it. Shift the balance of coughs and tiredness between her and Kim and the balance of performance changes too and you see Edith probably performing all 3 songs better tonight. Take away Kim's rehearsal time and it changes more in Edith's favour. It doesn't matter though as Kim is ideal for musical theatre according to Carrie if thats what she wants to do.

Not sure relative ability has much to do with why Carolynne is less visible than some high profile people.

Don't think the Edith Carolynne comparison works either. Edith isn't Carolynne but Kim certainly isn't Alex either. Almost certainly those are the wrong pairings. Carolynne was from the Debra school of vocal experimentation with a list of journey notes almost as long as Kim's. Carolynne had a better voice though and more power. Kim is probably closer to Carolynne than Edith is. Kim gets the basic emotion but rehearses her songs intensely and worked them all out with help phrase by phrase - today she was tired and with 4 songs couldn't nail them all down.

Edith on the other hand, does it the Alex way by inhabiting the lyric and adds a lot of musical knowledge and feel to work out what to do. she does it with her eyes too. She is very good on the ideas front - watch how she has thrown out ideas for the group songs and, according to David, she's the one who not only turns up with ideas but better ones than his. If you listen to what Richard, Lesley, David and Carrie are all saying (even the Orange man agrees saying how "nicely" Kim sings and how original Edith is) They all see Edith as the nearest thing they have to an Alex and she is the one they all talk about making albums if she ever wanted to. Not an easily impressed bunch that. Carolynne couldn't sing like that or deploy that degree of musical knowledge as well - but she was a better singer and we don't know if Edith can pen a song as well as Carolynne could. The interesting question would be if you could get Edith near to Carolynne's vocal ability or even reliability?


If you couldn't or Edith didn't want to, what else could you do with someone who understands music, knows a mistake when she hears one, has wide taste in music, is generally encouraging and knows what it is to sing in the circle of fear. Well you could make her a top DJ? Or perhaps a FA judge? Looks a natural to me - especially if you want to take out the pantomine element to avoid looking like Pop Idol.
Last edited by thenetworkbabe : 11-03-2005 at 02:01

You like that point, and I like disagreeing with it.

I'm not sure Edith's doing anything of a different kind than what I or many other people do when we sing. It's interesting only if the interpretations are, and Lesley's comment that Edith reminds her of the original artists suggests that Edith's interpretations aren't very original.

I thought Edith did "Shout", for instance, well, and even "Bridge" until things went wrong. But I don't think anyone gained any new insight into the songs or anything else from her performances.

She does a good job of singing in various styles, but I don't see any Alex-like ability to find (or put) something new in(to) a song.

And she seems to be using songs she knows, which makes finding an interpretation that reminds Lesley of the original rather easier.

A reason Edith doesn't need Kim-like help from the instructors is that Edith is singing largely within her existing ability and knowledge, while Kim is striving to accomplish something she couldn't manage before.

The interesting comparison would be one I think you suggested somewhere. Make Kim spend time learing to develop her own interpretations and Edith spend time improving her technical skills with the instructors' help. Then see what they can do.

Agreed that AP did learn a few tricks in FA, but her most memorable piece, "Beautiful", was being sung by her in public for donkeys ages before that first night when she so impressed the audience. AP literally had years to work that one up to suite her style. Edith (aka Suzi Quatro), as far as I know, hasn't had that luxury .

Stripped (the album containing the Beautiful track) was only released in late October 2002 and Beautiful was released as a single in late February 2003. As Alex went into FA in July 2003, she wouldn't even have had chance to be singing it 'in public for donkeys ages' or have 'literally ... years to work ... up to suit her style', never mind the inclination.
Last edited by T--J : 11-03-2005 at 03:30

Edith does something very similar to what Alex did in the music room singing quietly . She did it more with Carrie - where there was a different mood going on too - but even with David she sings each word with its meaning reflected in her voice. Lots of subtle stuff goes on. The actresses had a go at emotion and Kim usually asks the right question how do I sing this, but Edith is the only one i have seen just do it. What she doesn't do is carry that so much into the show performance and she can't hit the wow button so often to underline what the emotion is she is conveying. To be fair Alex usually took a longer lesson to get it right, had a jazz singers voice in reserve and enormous lung capacity and often had her backing tracks altered to fit the new concept so its not surprising if we are short on wow.


I think its the same interpreting skill though. David seems to think so too - though apart from duets and one afternoon they kept Alex with Carrie . Lesley's point I thought is the other thing you notice about Edith and Lesley, David and Carrie have all told us about. Edith knows so much music that she knows the style these songs ought to be sung in - she knows how to sing Sinatra. That doesn't mean she sings it just ike Sinatra or without her own touches or can't steal ideas from multiple sources - it just means it sounds right for what it is. Ade did it for punk and Reggie for rap but Edith does it for all sorts of styles.

Thats all why I think we had several cases of the judges disagreeing about her too. The feeling the song thing turns up with Bridge Over Troubled Water which she says is her favourite as she feels the song more and which she sings quietly in the music room with lots of things going on that don't quite make it to the performance - Richard wants Alex like wow on stage. The musical knowlege turns up when he gets criticised by Richard for not adding wow to her swing song and David and Carrie point out that that is how you sing swing . Edith knows what swing singers wouldn't do so she doesn't do it - result Richard and public not so enthused. Its the FA 2 problem with Peter and Paris where you had Carrie and David pointing out they wre doing the right things for people in their genres even if Richard wanted something else and the public wouldn't vote for them..

Suppose you had to sing something. Wouldn't you "just do it"?

Think of "Bridge over troubled water". The title alone suggests a great deal. Then the lyrics and the sound naturally suggest certain emotions. Try singing the words; that'll help too. Sure, you might not do as good a job on your own of finding suitable emotions as Simon and G, but you've heard their version.

And you know other songs. You can "steal ideas from multiple sources", you can add your "own touches", and, drawing on your musical knowledge, built up by listening to many songs, maybe dancing to them or singing them (perhaps you even play an instrument), make it "sound right for what it is", or even change it and do it in some other style.

Also songs can be tied to memories and can bring back emotions. Maybe you even picked this song because it has such memories.

So when I read your descriptions of what Edith does, I don't think "wow! how does she do that?" I think "that's the sort of thing I would do". I think "that's what you would do."

You and me and Edith and Alex would all be doing the same kind of thing. The differences would be in how inventive, insightful, or faithful to the original our interpretations were and in our ability to get our voices to do what was required.