The top 200 episode opens with a 3 minute scene-setting montage. Over the course of the first 3 episodes we have watched 28 contestants get their golden ticket to the top 200.
TORONTO
Taylor Abrahmse
Tetiana Ostapowych
Omar Lunan
Oliver Pigot
Sebastian Pigot
CALGARY
Jesse Cottam
Theo Tams
Brianne Chalifour
Earl Stevenson
MONTREAL
Amberly Thiessen
Philippe Langelier
Katherine St. Laurent
VANCOUVER
Shaun Francisco
Pat Melito
Vincent Vorkpor
WINNIPEG
Kayla Luky
Katelyn Dawn
Steve Porter
OTTAWA
Jonny Whitehead
Dan Young
Kristine Lankined
HAMILTON
Rufus
Nicholas J. Gordon
Jade Padua
Jessica Sheppard
Adam Castelli
HALIFAX
Mark Day
Lindsay Barr
Mitch MacDonald
We open with the four judges addressing the assembled 200. Over the course of 3 days this group will be whittled down to the 22 contestants who will appear in the live competition that starts this Sunday night. Over that time each performer gets one solo chance and one shot as part of a group to convince the judges that they deserve to continue.
Hamilton construction worker Adam Castelli starts us off, wearing black leather and playing acoustic. He gets the crowd clapping along to Ray Charles’ What’d I Say?
Philippe Langelier, he of the demon voice, plays it straight with Meat Loaf’s, I Won’t Do That and should have stuck with what he does best. He wouldn’t have survived day one, regardless, but now the guys in his speed metal band back in Montreal will never let him live this down. Hell, after this they may not even take him back.
We get our first new faces. A warm hello and quick good-bye goes out to Alex Simpson (hellish music hallish rendition of I’m Going Crazy), Regan Hiebert (his I Heard It Through the Grapevine suffers badly when compared to the version Earl Stevenson did in Calgary), and Mark Masztalerz (Dylanesque interpretation of Sinatra’s That’s Life would have worked much better if he’d sung in the same key that he played guitar).
Mark Sparks (great name) gives two not bad bars of Fly Me to the Moon. Greg Von Euw, a baby-face to give Mark Day competition for that much coveted distinction, plays the same supper club with a version of I’m Stepping Out that Jake calls, “A perfect example of not knowing when to stop.”
The competition breaks while the judges compare notes in preparation for the first cuts of the day. When ready, they call out a group of 11 or 12. It is unclear how many are eliminated, but we know that Adam Castelli makes it through, as does Amberly Thiessen, who we remember vaguely from the Montreal audition segment in Episode 2.
On his way out, demon-master Philippe tells us he knows he is, “too extreme for Canada.” Yep. That Meat Loaf, he sure is radical.
Next group, Dan, the kid with the mother who died of cancer April 14th, doesn’t do justice to We Are All Innocent and still gets through. C’mon, guys. This pity pass thing – okay once, but twice?
Oliver Pigot, looking like Henry Rollins and singing like Sting, blows the house down with Field of Gold. The judges join the crowd in a standing ovation. We learn that performances like Oliver’s that truly impress the judges earn the performer an immediate pass.
Katelyn Dawn, whom we met in Winnipeg, makes her first Toronto appearance. She does a country number and doesn’t seem to make much of an impression on the judges. Omar Lunen, from episode 1, does a great soul number that I wasn’t familiar with. Jessica Sheppard, back for her second attempt to break out of the top 200 and make it to the live performances, doesn’t help her case with an off key attempt to get growly on a soul tune and Lindsey Barr, the rocker from Halifax who did a great job on It’s Alright, Mama, does (I think) a Sass Jordan tune. Nice job of brown nosing. West African immigrant Vincent Vorkpor flat out butchers I Want You To Want Me by, “Cheap Tricks.”
The judges consider and decide. The entire group makes it through. Too bad. Sheppard and Vorkpor are going to waste more of out time.
New group. First up is Martin Kerr, from Edmonton with a British accent and bright red hair. Sounding a bit like James Blunt, he does something called Bleed Myself Dry and he is the first guy since episode 1 to really impress me. He impresses the judges as well and gets a pass.
Carly Campbell, a Vancouver bartender, does the Temptations nugget, Too Proud to Beg. Not great, but she gets the pass, too.
The next group starts with Kristine Lankined, another bartender, albeit one with a shiny new BA. She does Every Time I See Your Picture and doesn’t quite have the Luba’s pipes. The judges tell her to try another song and send her off to decide which one. I’m telling you, the producers want a young female and they are doing what they need to do to see to it that happens. Oliver Pigot is going to get screwed this season.
Corporal Whitehead is in the next group. He changes his song choice at the last second, does one of those Superman songs and gets himself a ticket back to Petawawa.
New face Lindsay Robins does an Alanis song. Because they show her sing and give her a name tag, I’m assuming she’s in. Take your time, Ms Lankined. You still haven’t got any competition.
Theo Tams, the 22 year old from Lethbridge who sweats like a pig, accompanies himself on piano and sings like an angle on In the Arms of an Angel. He shakes up everybody, including me. Beautiful.
Kristine comes back out and does Heart’s How Do I Get You Alone. The judges are disappointed, but pass her nonetheless. I think they just wanted to wipe the smirk off her face. She leaves relieved but confused, which may be just what the judges wanted.
Day two sees the contestants grouped in quartets and trios, except for Nick Gordon, the 16 year old trapped in a man’s body from the Hamilton audition and Taylor Abrahmse, the Juicy Fruit kid from episode 1. They are the day’s only duo.
Group 1: Three faceless, nameless guys who would be wearing red shirts if they were on Star Trek. The do Creedence’s Have You Ever Seen the Rain (warning: we are going to hear several versions) like they were drunk, singing around a campfire.
Group 2: Shaun Francisco, who we met in Vancouver. Martin Kerr, the red head James Blunt. For the first time, Paul Clifford, a 25 year old who looks like a 19 year old spiky haired, pierced eyebrow couch surfer. Paul has a killer gravelly voice, by the way and sings for far too short a time. And there is a woman as well, but I couldn’t put a name with the face. In any case, they were exquisite. Four part country harmonies with four great voices on a John Fogerty ballad: fuggedaboutit.
Group 3: A 19 year old from Winnipeg named Dominique Vouk with 3 nameless crewmen are as lose as the red shirts in scene 1.
Group 4: Four nameless guys shouting over the worst sounding electric guitar since I sold my Kingston.
Group 5: A quartet doing Creedence as interpreted by the choreographer for Showboat.
Group 6: Kristine, Carly Campbell from earlier tonight and a long haired blonde (Tetiana Ostapowych?) glorious on Taking the Long Way Home.
Group 7: Jen Dell Unto (haven’t got a clue), Jade Padua and 2 other women I can’t put names to.
Group 8: Omar (who did the arrangement, I gather), Rufus from the Hamilton auditions and 2 stranger white guys are sound like butterscotch tastes on Wishing Well.
Groups 9-12: we get a montage of Back Horse in a Cherry Tree as done by four groups; 1). duo Nick Gordon and Taylor Abrahmse, 2.) new girl Jenna Rae Walker and three friend, 3). our old bud Earl Stevenson with Kayla Luky and two others and 4). Theo Tams Katelyn Dawn and somebody else.
Group 13: Marie-Pierre Bellerose, Lisa Bell and some guy named Doug do Black Horse. Jake wants a sing off between the women, and Lisa kicks some Quebecois butt.
Group 14: This is gonna be great, the Pigot brothers, a guy named Mooky Morris and Tatiana, three of whom have impressed us and all of whom, Ben assures us, have impressed the judges. They do Ever Seen the Rain, with the brothers taking the first line and Sebastien Pigot taking the second. The other 3 jump in with a repeat and they’ve got this great swing to the 3-part they do on top of a lazy four-four rhythm on a six string. Mooky takes a refrain, then Tatiano, then Oliver. They do a chorus in four part and close out with some call and response. Magic.
Those who go through that I am sure of:
Vincent
Theo
Katelyn
Brandon
Omar,
Matt
Taylor
Nicholas
Sebastien
Oliver
Tatiana
Mooky
Shaun Francisco
Martin Ker
Paul Clifford
Lisa
Yeah, I know – they left us hanging about who Jake liked from the sing-off, Lisa or Marie-Pierre. Big suspense. It was Lisa
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