Sarah Duperron of Oliver put on a lively performance and ended up in third place. (Richard McGuire photo)
Dear Editor:
My family and I had the privilege of visiting your beautiful town in Osoyoos this past weekend.
After dinner we found ourselves walking on the beach and were drawn to music at the bandshell.
After some inquiring, we discovered that the Osoyoos Idol Competition would be beginning soon.
I am a piano and voice instructor so my family knew that we would be staying to listen in.
We wandered around while the warmup band finished then settled in to be amazed. And amazed we were.
The first contestant, Sarah, a 17 year old, was called to the stage. This beautiful young lady with vibrant pink hair took the stage for her performance.
When she started to sing and I recognized the choice in music, I couldn’t help but wonder if she had made a mistake.
She sang the song Gravity by Sarah Bareilles. Anyone that knows this music knows the complexity of this bluesy, pop song.
This extremely talented young lady sang this difficult piece with the confidence and intensity of vocalists far beyond her years.
I could not believe this sound and the vocal agility displayed.
It was truly amazing and provided a fantastic opening to the competition.
Several other contestants then sang songs before another young 17 year old took the stage.
This tiny beauty named Iza took the stage and entertained us with a superb rendition of Elvis’s huge hit called Trouble.
The showmanship of this young lady was absolutely incredible. Once again I was amazed by the confidence and poise displayed.
The third memorable contestant was a clean cut young man who broke into a wonderfully performed heavy-metal number. I believe his name was Emmanuel. I don’t know my heavy metal music so I really can’t tell you the name of the song, but he was awesome and was definitely a crowd favorite.
None of us were surprised to see all three of these competitors move on to round two as part of the top 10.
Round two was once again led off by Sarah.
This time she sang an almost flawless rendition of Adele’s hit Someone Like You.
Wow is all I can say. That about sums it up. Adele is not an easy artist to cover, but Sarah did it beautifully.
Iza’s second song was Blackbird by the Beatles and this young lady certainly did it justice.
Emmanuel’s second choice was a Led Zeppelin number and once again he did an awesome job on a music style that is often highly underrated. Most people don’t understand the complexity and talent needed to perform this kind of music.
When they announced the final five, I knew that two of my favorites, Iza and Emmanual, had not made it, which was a big mistake in my mind.
But Sarah did make it.
We had trouble understanding how Iza and Emmanual had been scored so low in the second round and how the others had scored so highly.
I guess the judges saw something in the other contestants that we didn’t.
Sarah was, by far, the youngest contestant in the finals, but this time they were reversing the order so she would sing last.
I couldn’t wait to hear her. She had me hooked.
The first performers did a pretty good job performing songs that were “easy” and required no real vocal skills besides being able to carry a tune – and the first two did a good job of carrying the tunes.
As far as I am concerned, they definitely saved the best for last.
First, there was a music glitch, which she handled like a pro.
Then there was a rude exchange from the music person, which most of the crowd heard.
Sarah held her ground and finally the correct backtrack was played.
Once again, what a treat as she played the song Toxic by by Brittany Spears.
It was everything I was waiting for. At one point in the song, a spontaneous eruption of applause made it evident that she had hooked everyone, not just me.
We all believed she had won.
The performance wasn’t nearly perfect, it WAS perfect.
Imagine our surprise when she was placed third.
She was so happy with her placing and I’m sure she didn’t realize how many of us watching thought she had been cheated.
If you were looking for a singer that had real talent, real vocal agility, an amazing range in pitch, incredible power in her voice and a magnetism that you can’t teach, then the wrong winner was declared, in my opinion.
This young lady chose songs to sing that I would have discouraged almost all of my students from singing and she sang them near perfection.
The difficulty level was incredibly high and I don’t think this was recognized or acknowledged by the judges.
After the show, I tried to speak to Sarah, but she was surrounded by many equally impressed fans.
So I spoke to some of the locals about Sarah.
They didn’t know much, just that she had starred in several of her school’s drama productions, that she was an excellent visual artist and she always had wild-coloured hair.
Someone that talented needs to be recognized and acknowledged. There must be someone in your community that has “connections” in the music industry?
There were several people in the audience recording her performances. Perhaps they can be tracked down so that people that can help further could hear and see this performance.
Please don’t let the talent of this young lady go unrecognized.
Perhaps you have the next Adele or Sarah Bareilles in your midst.
Thank you to Sarah, Iza, Emmanuel for your incredible performances as well as to all of the other performers at Osoyoos Idol.
Karen Johnson
Edmonton, AB
