WITH The announcement that The Voice will be coming to South Africa, and M-Net keeping mum on further details, we will speculate as to who we’d want to take part.
The show’s format goes as follows: there are three coaches, usually music gurus, who build teams from wannabe singers and pit them against each other. These contestants have to impress at least one coach at the beginning of every audition. If they get more than one coach interested, it is up to the contestant to choose a coach to run with for the competition. In the US they have the likes of Pharrell Williams and Christina Aguilera as coaches on The Voice. Who can we expect on our version? We have a few suggestions.
There are other TV talent shows with judges, mentors or hosts all pulled from our small local entertainment industry. To make things interesting we are going to attempt to select those people who have not been on TV in the capacity of a host, judge or mentor. Here are the people we think can make it on The Voice SA.
Kahn Morbee
One of the things that Randall Abrahams recently pointed out, which we do not talk about much, is the fact that we do not have good songwriters in this country. Kahn comes with that experience, as we have seen with most of his material from The Parlotones. He is also a great singer who respects music and will make sure his contestants learn a lot in the short time they are together.
Lira
Another prolific songwriter. It’s surprising that talent shows haven’t snapped up this songbird in the past. Perhaps it is because of her busy schedule or that the timing wasn’t right. Look anywhere you like, nothing bad has been written about Lira. She has so much heart one could learn a lot under her wing.
Kabomo
Very view people get the art of harmonies the way Kabomo does. Very few people write singing and rap parts in one song. Very few people write poetry to those songs. Kabomo does it all effortlessly. Sitting on his third album Sekusile, it is clear that the man can do whatever sound he chooses to and being coached by a multi-talented personality like him should be a dream for many singers.
Tamara Dey
Now this songbird has pipes few can match! It would actually be intimidating for many untrained contestants to be in her presence. Yet, if you are willing to learn, you would be in the right hands. Tamara has done so well in crossing over to a varied landscape of fans, which is feat few get right.
Several others could make the cut and we can throw around names like Karen Zoid, Ross Learmonth, Clint Brink, Busiswa, Donald and Alexis Faku. It is going to be interesting to see who makes it. The coaches will only be revealed later in the year.