Monday, February 6, 2006

Grammy Central: Best Female Pop Vocal Performance

About 48 hours to go before the big night! This is the last category being highlighted before the ceremony. You can check out my prediction and picks for Album, Record and Song of the Year, plus Best New Artist in this week's issue of the Seattle Gay News. The link is below. I'll do a last-minute update and preview on Wednesday.

http://sgn.org/sgnnews34_05/page21.cfm

I've had a great time doing this for you. Keep track of the Oscars race with my fab co-writer Lorelei Quenzer right here. Here's a look at an always-close race.

Best Female Pop Vocal Performance

It's Like That - Mariah Carey
Since U Been Gone - Kelly Clarkson
Good is Good - Sheryl Crow
I Will Not Be Broken - Bonnie Raitt
Hollaback Girl - Gwen Stefani

This is a closely watched category each year, and this time around it features the top three selling female artists of 2005 in an all-out catfight, Mariah Carey, Kelly Clarkson and Gwen Stefani. Missing from the list are Madonna and Fiona Apple.

My prediction is that it's too close to call between Carey, Stefani and Clarkson. Grammy voters usually reward younger artists here (Norah Jones, Christina Aguilera, Nelly Furtado), so that bodes well for the latter two. Carey, riding on a hugely successful year, may get a boost from voters who feel 5 million copies sold of "The Emancipation of Mimi" has to be recognized outside of the major races.

My personal pick is Kelly Clarkson. Plain and simple, as the category title suggests, it's the best performance turned in of these five respected contenders.

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