I first saw this video of Susan Boyle on the BBC show “Britain’s Got Talent,” yesterday via Andrew Sullivan’s site. Then my friend Jake mentioned it. Then Andrew Sullivan brought it up again. I’m sure it’s making the rounds like nobody’s business. Everytime I see it I tear up, but you know me. Anyway check it out. Don’t make me sit you down and have you watch it with me hanging over your shoulder. That’s not fun for anybody.

The clip is, in effect, what these shows are supposed to be about: discovering talent that otherwise gets overlooked. In that sense — not to mention who Susan is, and what’s she been through, and how she triumphed — it’s uplifting. Incredibly so. Hell, she reduces Simon Cowell to a little boy holding his face in his hands and smiling and sighing.

Yet the unanswered (unasked) question is: How could this woman not be discovered before this? How could she not have a career as a singer? Even a little career in her little village? With a voice like that?

Put it this way: If she looked like that middle female judge she’d be a star. But she doesn’t so she wasn’t even a professional. She just sang – where? In the shower? Since she was 12? All because of where she was born and how she talked and how she looked?

It’s a truly inspiring clip. At the same time it’s reminding us, on this most superficial of shows, just how superficial our society can be.

Posted at 04:13 PM on Tuesday April 14, 2009 in category Music  

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