Racist? How is it racist??? Does Aretha Franklin sound like a black woman? Yes. Does Elvis look like a white man? Yes. Absolutely NOTHING racist with those observations.
What's weird is that people hear a "black woman" or a "white man". Not Aretha Franklin or Elvis. That's mind boggling.
Are those still the "identifiers" in the year 2010 where plenty of white women sing Jazz and plenty of black man and women sing Opera? Michael's beautiful tenor is just that- a beautiful tenor. Michael's voice is still unique in this world and he could have sang just about anything.
And his boy soprano would have worked just as excellent in any Italian boy's choir.
There is nothing rascist in the observation that there are physiological differences between different races, that is not rascist. My white patients often had different contact lens parameters than my black patients- and my Asian patients had others characteristics.
What is rascist, is to go on spontaneous rants about "white untrained amateurs"- all because you heard some low quality youtube leak on an Internet forum, that some people snatch and turn into lousy MP3s- it's naive at best. What if it's Michael Jackson? That's almost comical.
What is rascist about it, is the constant emphasis on any singers color of skin, may that singers name be Aretha Franklin, Elvis or Michael Jackson.
I hear music and a voice- if someone's color of skin is the first thing you associate with any kind of music- that is disturbing.
I probably spent way too much time in a conservatory where literally people off all races studied the same thing- music.
I am not denying differences between human beings- but what is rascist about such language and thinking is to identify a human being as skin color first and as musician and personality second. It's like dividing your friends A, B and C into gay, white and asian before you even think of their names.
Because the vocalist on KYHU is an untrained White amateur. Not a black soul male vocalist raised at the school of Motown. If you can't hear that I don't know what you've been listening to on becoming a fan!
Your original statement was disturbing and it has nothing to do with being overly PC. Michael Jackson broke barriers where they needed to be broken and yes, that was way before Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama. No doubt about it.
But he most certainly wasn't stuck in a time warp in the 50ies. Michael left Motown grew as an artist- what he achieved has to do with dedication and hard work. He would have never go on the way he did if he kept singing A,B,C for the rest of his life. Every great artist leaves his "schooling" behind at some point- when he reaches the point where his "school" holds him back by molding him into the "school mold".
I am amazed how far people take the "fake vocals" stuff and project even weirder stuff into the "fake" debate.
