The 'American Idol' finale is going south, but the show has always been a little bit country
It's a country music finale for "American Idol" this year, with young Lauren Alaina and Scotty McCreery battling for the title, leaving some pop fans unhappy. But the show has always had a deep connection with the south: Six of its nine previous champions come from the region, and Carrie Underwood remains the top-selling former Idol.
As Ann Powers points out in The Times Tuesday, the country music offers these performers a boost, giving them "a way to explore the same sensual pleasures and upwardly mobile dreams that rock and soul also address, but within a resolutely wholesome, cheerfully conformist framework. This has long been part of the Nashville sensibility. Tradition isn't a door to be shut against the modern world, but a frame within which its more challenging elements are contained."
Read more on the country music "Idol" finale here.
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Photo: Scotty McCreery and Lauren Alaina. Credit: Frank Micelotta / Fox
