The Stroud Subscription Rooms are awash with talented singers, musicians and dancers on Saturday, 31 January as the Undiscovered Youth Talent Contest of 2004 gets underway.

And Here's Your Host...

BBC Gloucestershire's own John Rockley hosts the evening, while respected record producers, choreographers and musicians face the difficult challenge of judging the competition.

All tastes are catered for from jazz standards and easy listening classics such as "Summertime" and "I've Got You Under my Skin" to covers of Britney Spears songs and original rock songs from local bands.

Audience Participation:

It is, in the words of one enthusiastic audience member, a "fantastic opportunity. Where else do young people get the chance to sing or perform on stage with the lights and audience? It's a great experience, even if it doesn't go any further."

She is, of course, right. Even though some of the performances are far from perfect, the experience should, for the persistent, be enough to act as a form of encouragement to keep going.

The Edited Highlights:

In all, twenty-six artists and groups perform. There's not enough room here for a review of all of them, so I'll just pick out a few of the highlights of the evening.

One of the first acts to cause an impressive impression is Dazee Taylor singing Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful". Her voice is and stage presence is so powerful, that she should have begun her act with the line "Tonight John, I am going to be Christina Aguilera (only slightly better dressed)." A very good performance indeed.

Winging it:

A few acts later comes Dazee's most obvious rival: Hannah Rogers. John Rockley introduces her song, "Wind Beneath My Wings", saying, "If you are not moved to tears by the end of this song, you are a truly evil person."

Despite my evil, dry-eyed reaction, I can acknowledge talent when I hear it. Hannah too has a powerful voice - so powerful that it sets the glitter ball off.

No Place Like Stroud Subscription Rooms:

The final performance of the first half is Sally-Ann Hill performing "Over the Rainbow". Now SHE is a good singer. It's easy enough to have stage presence when you're doing a loud song.

But with a quiet, more reflective song, it's a lot more difficult. Nevertheless, Sally-Ann Hill performs the song with an enviable style and ease.

Ding Ding, Round Two:

After the interval, and once the judges have been dragged back from the bar with the reluctance of a child being coaxed out of a sweet shop, the singing and dancing continues. The organisers have certainly saved the best till last.

One such example is a band called Elysium, who share their state-of-ideal-happiness name with a song by Apache Rose whom I reviewed a couple of weeks ago.

Sax and Goths and Rock'n'Roll:

Like Apache Rose, they sound far from happy. Unlike Apache Rose, they have a saxophone player. How, I wonder, will a saxophone ever be heard over the Evanescence-esque noise?

Amazingly, it does. It even gets a solo. Which is something I think a lot of goth metal bands seem to be missing out on at the moment. There just aren't enough gothic sax solos out there.

Despite the odd combination, Elysium are a good band. They may consider themselves the second best band from Dursley. But that could soon change.

Dancing Queen:

Dance acts are not something I profess to knowing a lot about. What I do know, though, is that Lorna Harris is good. Lorna Harris is very good.

Lorna Harris is so good in fact that she shouldn't be in this competition at all. She should be presenting her own hour long television show full of her just dancing. Now that would be a licence fee well spent.

Lorna has already performed in front of a thousand people and will, no doubt, dance before a few thousand more before she hands in her dancing shoes. Miming along to the lyrics of "Sparkling Diamonds" from Moulin Rouge, she spins round at such a great speed that you feel dizzy watching her.

Aimee Can:

And then there is Aimee Ballinger's "Sunday Girl", the second Blondie cover of the night. Aimee bounds onto the stage full of enthusiasm that doesn't fade the whole time she is on stage. The odd note is a little off key, but this does not affect the overall performance. This is a Debbie Harry song, after all. And since when did she get all her notes on pitch?

Best till Last (But Two):

The triumph of my evening, however, comes three acts before the end in the form of Olivia Jones. Olivia sings Shakira's "Underneath Your Clothes". She sings with confidence and maturity and style and superb quality. And she's eleven. That's right: ELEVEN! How can an eleven year old be that good? How? How? Just tell me how.

Dead Certs:

There are, of course, a great many other performances that I have overlooked. There is the only solo male input from Sam Clifford ("Why God, Why?"), Lee-Marie Baker's "Black Velvet" which is as smooth as the velvet she sings of, there's the Smoking Seasons (whose guitarist had just become a father), and there's Lindsay Martin, lead singer of the Gloucester Youth Jazz Orchestra singing "I've Got You Under My Skin".

Underdogs:

But these are probably the odds-on favourites. The more interesting performances will always come from the surprises of the evening, like Goth rock bands with saxophones, somebody making "Wind Beneath My Wings" sound GOOD, and an eleven year old taking your breath away with a Shakira song.

And that's what talent contests were invented for.

01/02/04 - First published on www.bbc.co.uk/gloucestershire