Susan Boyle’s 2009 Britain’s Got Talent audition was one of the great coups of reality TV, her success surprising and inspiring in equal measure. It’s some time now, though, since she has surprised anyone, and while her voice is still the lithe, purring instrument that so astonished Piers Morgan, her act clings to the tried and tested which, despite a mixed reception for her live tour, can still empty Sony’s warehouses like no other.
Having a limited expressive range doesn’t necessarily matter when you’re good at what you do. We shouldn’t expect Boyle to turn into Piaf or Winehouse any more than we expect, say, Ray Winstone to play a Woody Allen role or Hugh Grant one written for Arnold Schwarzenegger (though it might be fun to watch). And you can’t really complain that an album entitled Hope contains a lot of uplifting songs.
The arrangements announce her belting climaxes with the subtlety of a medieval siege engine at the ramparts
Two buts. Too many of these arrangements are just platforms for Boyle to stand and deliver the lung-busting, vibrato-laden phrases we’re all now pretty familiar with. Both phrasing and pronunciation suffer to facilitate those long, heady vowels, with, for example, “heaven” pronounced “hvuuuuun” or “people” “pipuuuuul”. The instrumental arrangements announce her belting climaxes with the subtlety of a medieval siege engine at the ramparts, so there’s a crashing piano phrase, a drum roll, bells and a fanfare, where some delicacy would have been preferable.
The repertoire is similarly uninspired. Boyle’s musical development mainly took place in church, and the explicitly religious numbers are charming and heartfelt, even if the arrangements are larded with sentimental ornament. “Imagine”, on the other hand, is a woeful choice. Is there anyone in all music less like John Lennon than Susan Boyle? It makes no sense for her to be singing about “no religion” straight after the pious “Abide With Me”. It’s time, now, to see how she fares with a different mood or genre. Susan Boyle is an admirable, brave woman, but her dream has already come true to the tune of 20 million albums. Time to sing a different song.
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