Lionel Richie was supposed to be a celebrity contestant on the new ABC TV singing contest “Duets.” The latest word is that he is being replaced by John Legend. As much as I love Lionel Richie, this is a great development from a vocal quality perspective. Richie survives on a being a great songwriter, not so much a singer. I’d give a big edge to John Legend if we are just talking vocals.
Lionel’s latest “Tuskegee” album is doing great. It debuted at #2 but has jumped up to #1 this past week.
“Duets” pits four celebrity contestants against each other, but they are not competing as solo artists. Rather, each celebrity does a duet with two different contestants. These other contestants are unsigned artists, and the winner wins a record deal with Hollywood Records.
Joining John Legend on the celebrity side of “Duets” are Kelly Clarkson, Robin Thicke, and Jennifer Nettles. There is no list yet of the non-celebrity duet partners.
“Duets” premieres on ABC on May 24, 2012. It starts at 8 Eastern time. The ABC home page for the show does not give details of the actual format except to say that the celebrities will be picking two duet partners from around the country. I do know that Kelly Clarkson has performed duets with some of the potential partners on her current tour.