Pitch Slapped - General Discussion

[Meredith Quill]

Discuss Pitch Slapped Here!

[Primetimer]

The new docuseries is betting you still really love a cappella puns and cheesy competition. But will you?

Read the story

[Thog]

Thanks for the reminder! My cousin (once removed) is one of the featured high school singers, and I'd completely forgotten it premiered tonight. This would never be on my radar otherwise, and I'm not sure I'll stay past the first episode. Whatever the outcome (or the ratings), they apparently had a heck of a time filming it.

[taragel]

Aw bummer, doesn't sound nearly as enjoyable as Lifetime's Sing It On, which I quite liked.

[Trixieagogo]

Ugh - that woman coach is the WORST.  There's confident and then there's confident while performing for the cameras which is a whole other level of please-somebody-make-her-stop.  I marathon'ed Sing It On this weekend and will stay with that  - Pitch-Slapped is flat and a pass.  

[GaT]

I liked it & I'll continue watching, but I don’t like Diana, & I hate her style of coaching. The guy who said she was more concerned with beating Deke than helping them win was correct. She also speaks like Nicole If-I-Don’t-Get-This-House Curtis which is annoying.

 

It took me a while to realize that every time it said “Stay Tuned” at the bottom of the screen, they weren’t showing upcoming scenes, that was the name of the group. LOL

[SrPab]

I know it's tv (more specifically, a "docu-series") but...another woman gets the Bitch Edit. Not knowing Diana at all, I wonder how exaggerated her persona/character is for this show. Because Deke's persona has to be closer to her polar opposite (since they aren't going for subtlety) it seems like the worst thing they saddled him with was having a massive brain fart.

 

It's not even "no choreo". It's "no movement". Handicapping your scrappy, plucky group from the get-go...makes for better viewing? I understand his overall point on stripping their performance down and concentrating on good singing and singing technique (emotional investment, telling a story, blend, harmonies, etc.). But, I think they could have accomplished while incorporating simple block movement and restrained gesticulations; less-is-more as opposed to less-is-nothing.

 

You could even boil it down to easy math: it was stated that Deke's group played a close second fiddle several times to Diana's group. If the difference between first versus second place is a handful of points, couldn't effective block movement have given them those few extra points in the score sheets to get them over the hump? [i'm mainly thinking in terms of real world competitions.]

Edited January 6, 2016 by SrPab

[ClareWalks]

Diana is AWFUL. Making the whole group be all "Team Diana," it really is all about her and not the kids/group. Holy crap, what an ego.

[ejsquire]

They should have packaged this into half hours. It's 1/3 show, 1/3 "coming up next", and 1/3 "previously". I don't need a previously to remind me what happened before a commercial break.

[Darian]

Team Diana has a name, you narcissist. It's Highlands Voices. She can talk all day about building a team and teamwork, but she won't call the team by their name.  Maybe she did, but all I heard was "Team Diana." I kept drifting. She's insufferable and I can put up with a lot for a cappella.     

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I already hated Diana based solely upon the fact that she left her sunglasses on top of her head for the entire episode.

 

I know it was hard for Stay Tuned to hear Deke say that Highlands Voices was better than them in every technical way, but I liked that he was very specific about the things that the other group did better because I think that Stay Tuned has probably not understood why they keep losing to them.

 

Deke is clearly supposed to be the good guy coaching the scrappy underdogs, but even without that, I really like how specific he is about everything (like saying that Stay Tuned is a choir, not an a cappella group). I totally agree that he would have an easier time coaching them to a win if they cut the group by half, but I am glad that he didn't make them do that. As he said, a choir group is a family. You can't just ditch half the group right before you start competing. I also really liked that he went back to basics with them.

 

I'm not a fan of Diana playing mind games with Vanessa to motivate her, but at the same time as someone who was in choir, I get what Diana was saying. There are always politics involved in a performance group and if you're a talented senior, you do get handed a lot of solos because it's just expected. I was wondering if Deke and Diana would come in with a fresh pair of eyes and assign solos to other people.

 

Hee, and I love Andrew for speaking up and telling Diana that they could start rehearsal if she would stop yelling at them. As for Vanessa and the other girl leaving early, I am cutting everyone some slack because I would guess that when they agreed to do this show, they did not plan on having to commit to 24/7 rehearsals. If they made commitments to whatever else before Diana showed up, then it's fine for them to leave early in my book.

 

As for Diana yelling at them for screwing up the choreography, STFU. These are not professional dancers. It can take a lot of time for singers to learn choreography, let alone perfect. And while I agree in theory that stamina is important, you aren't going to get that by jogging around the track for the first time the day before a competition. That's like saying doing 100 situps once will give you abs of steel.

 

I was surprised that the scores for both groups were read at the competition. Is that a new thing or something just for this show? When I was in choir, I remember we were given score sheets afterward but only for our own group and they definitely didn't announce how many points each group scored before handing out trophies.

 

It took me a while to realize that every time it said “Stay Tuned” at the bottom of the screen, they weren’t showing upcoming scenes, that was the name of the group. LOL

Ha, I did the same thing.

[hilaryvm]

It took me a while to realize that every time it said “Stay Tuned” at the bottom of the screen, they weren’t showing upcoming scenes, that was the name of the group. LOL

 

I also did this during the whole show.  I kept fastforwarding because I thought it meant commercials were about to start.

 

I didn't think either group sounded all that great in the final performance, although I did think Vanessa had a lovely voice when she auditioned for the song.

[leighdear]

I think Diana watched too many episodes of "Glee" with her choreography schemes.  No way those kids are going to by synchronized and perfectly coordinated just because she demands it.  And sorry, you do not get sedentary teens in shape with ONE session of lap running and a few jumping jacks.  They were probably just sore and annoyed. 

 

I will say the kids all have pretty good attitudes and seem to want guidance.  

 

And I'm totally on board with the whole "Deke is the good Coach and Diana is Satan" concept, so that's where I am.  

[outerspaceexplorer]

"I already hated Diana based solely upon the fact that she left her sunglasses on top of her head for the entire episode."

Get ready for lots more of that. It's a look she's been cultivating for years and she thinks it's adorable (it's not).

As for the scoring, this competition doesn't actually exist (though the groups do). It was created by the show, so everything is for TV.

[GaT]

As for the scoring, this competition doesn't actually exist (though the groups do). It was created by the show, so everything is for TV.

I was wondering why they were the only two teams competing, I would enjoy this more if it was a real competition.

[CoyoteBlue]

We have:

• Scrappy underdogs full of heart versus
• the heartless arrogant juggernaut competing 
• in a show with just the two of them that is 
• nevertheless apparently big enough for them to get trophies at
• the juggernaut wins, setting up the scrappy underdogs for a feel-good comeback story for the season.

 

Sorry, I don't care what their names are, I'm calling them "Vocal Adrenaline" and "New Directions", because seriously, this is like a bad knockoff of just the competition episodes of Glee. Even worse, New Directions is an entire choir of Rachel Berrys mugging so hard during the song in place of actual skill emoting that you wonder if someone needs an ambulance.

Edited January 9, 2016 by CoyoteBlue

[futurechemist]

It's an interesting show.  I think there should be more realistic music on TV to help counter-balance high school football.  I'm also an inherently non-competitive person.  My high school band director had a policy of not competing and his Masters research showed that the more that a high school musical program engages in competitions, the less likely the students are to continue in music after high school.

 

Music is meant to be enjoyed, not competed.  So I had a much greater appreciation for Deke's "you need to connect with the song" over Diana's "you need to beat the other team".  And I hope the show doesn't overplay the whole competition aspect.

[Jadzia]

I was confused because sometimes people called the group Highlands Voices and sometimes Highland Voices. I think even the judge called them the singular version.

[Darian]

I was confused because sometimes people called the group Highlands Voices and sometimes Highland Voices. I think even the judge called them the singular version.

[very quiet voice, no choreo, blushing] I looked it up. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I was going with Highlands Voices because that's what was on the wall behind them when they performed at the "competition." I also noticed it earlier because it seemed so awkward to say.

 

very quiet voice, no choreo

You have SO MUCH HEART! Deke would approve.

[Jadzia]

I was going with Highlands Voices because that's what was on the wall behind them when they performed at the "competition." I also noticed it earlier because it seemed so awkward to say.

 

I should clarify: I was confused because IIRC one of the group's members called it the singular version. So I was like "Shouldn't she know what her group is called?"

 

Maybe she just had a hard time saying it, because it is awkward.

Edited January 12, 2016 by Jadzia

[GaT]

Still don't like Diana. Stay Tuned may be the worst group of "dancer" ever. Not a single drop of any kind of rhythm in the bunch.

[leighdear]

Not a bad episodes, but Diana is such an extreme caricature, she looks & acts like she came right out of a Saturday Night Live skit.  I liked Sam, but having them harping on their "lesbian underdog who unexpected gets her shot at stardom" theme was a bit heavy handed.  

 

Diana's team is SO small, with only 3 girls. Is that the normal size for a group?  Because that seems like a huge risk to have so few people.  It doesn't need to be as big as Deke's group, but a few more people seems logical. 

 

I am so incredibly weary of hearing that Sam Smith song.  And the inappropriateness of High School kids crooning about a dude having a 1-night stand and not wanting the other person to leave is skanky to me.  

[SrPab]

Good grief is Diana ever getting the (Disney) Villain Edit! All of the quick-cut editing is mutually reinforcing. Meanwhile Deke's Nice Guy Edit sometimes makes him come across as a buffoon (when he's otherwise not being the Wise Elder/Teacher to his Grasshoppers). Describing them as caricatures--especially Diana--seems apt.

 

Is the production team for this show being blackmailed by the the ones who do Dance Moms...or is this Lifetime's "template" for all of their reality-style programming? I don't watch much of anything on this channel.

 

I mean...this second episode's script has two new groups "competing" against Highlands Voices and Stay Tuned. HV and ST weren't in direct competition with one another. Surprise, surprise...HV and ST out-scored the other groups...and Team Diana "won" again. Although, I preferred HV's performance over ST's.

Edited January 14, 2016 by SrPab

[CPRSarah]

I haven't even watched this show, but I've known that red headed attention seeker for years and that is exactly how she is in real life. But, the show probably wanted a bitch. They wouldn't have cast someone like her if they didn't want "tough love." She may not be a nice person, or even slightly polite, or have manners, but the show picked her for all those reasons, so obviously that is the route they are taking. I've seen Deke before and he's a pretty stand up guy. I don't think a show should celebrate the coaches, more than the students. That is great for their egos.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I didn't know whether to roll my eyes or laugh when Diane was talking about how Stay Tuned's choreography sucked and that her group's was sooooo much better. The staging was better, so I will give her that, but it wasn't amazing or even complicated choreography. Lean in, arm movement. Wow, so advanced. On a shallow note, the girls in HV had cute dresses (you could see that one of the girls was really tall because the skirt was so much shorter on her though).

 

Heh, and poor Deke - he really was giving them a pretty easy out with the choreography by using the Soul Train section. It takes up a lot of time and allows people to be cheesy and show their personalities but most of them were barely able to do that. I think that they are not used to dancing so they were really self conscious, but I totally felt his frustration.

 

One thing I like about HV is that one of the guys is not shy about making his opinion known. Last week he told Diane to quit yelling at them so they could use their rehearsal time to rehearse. This week when she was bring a drama queen about the soloist being sick and that she couldn't just bring one of the other girls forward to do the solo, he said, "Well, that's better than forfeiting." HA! I love that Diane is wasting time flailing and yelling, "I don't know what we're going to doooooo!" and he just got all practical.

[dmmetler]

Gotta love it when the high school kids are more sensible than the adults.

 

I majored in music, and Diana is a typical personality type that you see a lot at the college level, less so below that-the failed performer who ended up teaching and resents it, so takes it out by being the big b-word queen diva. Female or male. Deke is more the person who ends up teaching at the high school level-the one who truly enjoys teaching and seeing their kids do well, and no longer needs to be a star.

 

But yeah, Vocal Adrenaline vs New Directions,and you just KNOW that Deke's team will pull off a win by the end of the season. Because, don't you know, they have heart.

 

I'll continue watching. I'll watch almost anything with dancing or singing in it, and this show doesn't make my heart hurt for the kids. 

[GaT]

Vocal Forte was much better than Highlands Vocals, I think they got robbed for benefit of the show. I did think Stay Tuned was better than Sound Explosion though.

[mcrfan78]

I want to know who thought it was appropriate for this woman to come into a high school and interact with the students with her blouse cut so low and half her boobies on display. I'm far from what you would call "conservative" and even I noticed how bad that looks. Episode 3 her outfit is even worse! Hey Diana, save the lingerie for the boudoir! %uD83D%uDE05%uD83D%uDE11

[Whimsy]

Vocal Forte was much better than Highlands Vocals, I think they got robbed for benefit of the show. I did think Stay Tuned was better than Sound Explosion though.

I agree.  Those scores were absolutely ridiculous.  This show is just so fake I can't stand it.  I liked all four performances, so that's why I'll stick with this, but the "competitions" are so stupid.  They are not ACTUAL recognized competitions.  They're just weird pretend competitions the producers set up.  There's no real suspense there because it doesn't mean anything at all.  I actually was very amused by Vocal Forte's reactions to the scores.  You could tell they didn't give two shits about those scores.  They mean nothing. 

 

Besides all of that- I thought both of our teams pulled off really great performances and I was blown away by Blue.  I think he is just so adorable.  I have definite maternal feelings towards him. 

 

Oh, and I think I will look up Vocal Forte on You Tube later when I have some time.  They were pretty damn awesome!

[Alapaki]

The scoring was silly.  I was surprised that they showed one of the coach's calling out the scores.  

 

Also, I though both of these teams were based in central or northern New Jersey?  If this was at "Stay Tuned"'s "home-field", why did they show the Philly skyline on the way to the competition?

 

Otherwise I guess this is relatively harmless reality entertainment.

[Lovecat]

I love the way they all sit there with tense faces until every single score is revealed and our "heroes" are announced as the winner of their respective bouts.  Those scores are so damn lopsided that anyone with basic math skills probably doesn't need the announcer to reveal the final outcome.  So very fake, this whole thing, but I do like the singing, so I will keep watching and rolling my eyes.  And rooting for Deke, because he's adorbs.

[Alapaki]

I love the way they all sit there with tense faces until every single score is revealed and our "heroes" are announced as the winner of their respective bouts.  Those scores are so damn lopsided that anyone with basic math skills probably doesn't need the announcer to reveal the final outcome.

 

 

Exactly!  I think in "Stay Tuned"'s round, they were up by 17 points before the final category was revealed.  As soon as it was revealed that they'd gotten at least 3 (out of possible 20) there was no numerical way they could lose.  But they acted as though they were on the edges of their seats.

[SrPab]

They'll have one for each episode...but if you don't already know, AfterBuzz has put these up on YT:

 

S1E1 Review & After Show

S1E2 Review & After Show

S1E3 Review & After Show

 

Ep. 3 Diana didn't seem to twirl her mustache as much...but maybe I've just become inured to it. And Hospitalized!Deke...I'd love one scene of him hopped up on medication. Will the earnestness still come across; will he be psycho? Or will he be psychotically earnest--but one can't tell?

Edited January 21, 2016 by SrPab

[LennieBriscoe]

All I know is, this is one of the campiest shows ever! Earnest Deke! Deluded Diana! "Highlands with an 's'."  "But who will be our Beat-boxer, if our Beat-boxer SINGS?!" "Now we know we can get along without the SENIORS!" LOVE IT!

 

Say "Geronimo!"

Edited January 21, 2016 by LennieBriscoe

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I swear that I am not just remembering my high school years with rose-colored glasses, but we did not have such a huge divide between the seniors and the other classes. We had non-seniors who did solos every year. There were definitely cliques within our choir, but they were about who was BFFs/dating each other, rather than who was a senior vs who was a junior/sophomore. We never thought of the sophmores or juniors as the JV squad. There were years when we had amazing freshmen.

 

Vocal Forte did a good job of showing how simple choreography and staging can still be very effective. They didn't change formations. Most of their choreography was heads up and down and squatting/standing up, but they did it so cleanly that it looked awesome.

 

Diana wasn't twirling her moustache this week but she was still her annoying self. Yes, this is all about HER and how this performance will make HER look like a fool if her group doesn't win. Gawd. SHUT IT. Despite this, I will say that I loved her immediate criticism of Blue falling back on the same hand gestures was perfect. A lot of people have those performance tics. One of the guys in my choir had a hand gesture he did when he was nervous and I kid you not, there was one solo where he did the same hand gesture like ten times during a thirty second solo.

 

What the hell is a senior prom weekend in the middle of the summer?

 

I agree that the other groups aren't taking this seriously. They know it's just a chance to perform on tv and that the bogus scoring is stupid. I mean, seriously, Highlands Voices scored ten points higher than Vocal Forte in two different categories? I love that Deke still thinks this is a real competition and took offense on behalf of Vocal Forte.

 

I was a little disappointed that Deke said Sound Explosion was more polished and Jack said that they looked even better than in their video, yet we saw barely any of their performance so that we could compare them to Stay Tuned.

 

On a shallow note, when I saw Jack sitting in the audience in his suit next to Deke, for a split second I thought, "What the hell is Daniel Radcliffe doing here?"

 

I hate that this show perpetuates the Glee myth that choir groups will learn a song a few days before a competition.

[SrPab]

AfterBuzz TV - S1E4 Review & After Show
AfterBuzz TV - The Concert Experience: Deke Sharon Interview
 
Ep. 4...DRAH-MAH! Mustaches are twirled and, gasp, guitars get smashed. But like an after-school special (or a Very Special Episode), everybody makes nice-nice at the end--except for all those times shade is thrown.

Edited January 27, 2016 by SrPab

[JoannKB]

I wish this show were more real. I would watch a reality show about show choirs during competition season if it showed actual, real competitions instead of this fake thing. I also am completely bothered by the fact that they don't show or even mention the regular choir director. These groups don't lead themselves. If I were a choir director who had spent years coaching and leading these teams and preparing them for competition only to have some famous show choir consultant come in for a TV show, and for the kids to not even mention my name (I'm sure if they did it would be edited out), I would be annoyed. 

[GaT]

I wish this show were more real. I would watch a reality show about show choirs during competition season if it showed actual, real competitions instead of this fake thing. 

Yeah, I agree, that's what I liked about "Sing it On" it was real. This is so fake they probably all get scripts before the cameras start rolling.

[Thog]

I watch this with my 8-year-old son, and episode 4 led to an interesting discussion about respect for authority vs. standing up for yourself. Diana has been positively awful, and clearly Andrew's attempt to quit had a positive effect on the team dynamics (though her interviews suggest that Diana is just faking the nice bit). The thing is, I don't really like the message that the kids are in charge and they can change her coaching style if they don't like it by threatening to walk out. The last thing I want is my kid thinking that if his 3rd grade teacher (or coach, or parent, etc.) is too "mean" he gets to protest. Obviously Deke's style is more fun and seems effective - the kids are working hard to please him as much as to improve themselves - but Diana isn't Deke and the kids don't get to choose. Having said all that, though, I do think Andrew genuinely felt the need to bow out and wasn't just being manipulative. He seemed to communicate with Diana respectfully rather than storming out in a huff, though he didn't seem to take into account the effect his actions would have on the group. I also appreciated his willingness to hear her out and rejoin the group without a ton of drama. I have to wonder what all happened behind the scenes and how much of that played out as we saw it.

[dmmetler]

I really didn't like Stay Tuned's performance this week. It just didn't sound good, at least not on my TV.

Having said that, I would much rather have my child with Deke than Diana.

[GaT]

The whole problem with Diana is that she cares more about beating Deke than about helping her group get good enough to win. Just the fact that she keeps calling them "Team Diana" instead of Highlands Voices is a dead giveaway. When they had a montage showing her trying to to coach the team over a few days, at one point she said something like "I will not lose to Deke!", she considers this her competition, not the groups competition.

[Thog]

Yeah, I was just starting to warm up to her, and then I saw her daughter wearing a "Team Mommy" t-shirt. Ugh.

[Alapaki]

And the group wasn't wrong by pointing out that having 19/20 of them sitting around twiddling their thumbs while each one (at least 16 of whom had no realistic chance or desire to sing lead) were forced to "audition" for lead.

Once again the scoring was just silly. I wish they'd just give up the pretext of these being "competitions". Or maybe just have them sing against each other and carry each week's scores over to reach a cumulative total at the end of the season.

And Diana? Two things.

1). Try to put the tits away during the rehearsals. No one's buying them and shouldn't be selling.

2). I knew the 80's. I lived through the 80's. "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" was NOT the "soundtrack to the 80's."

[ElectricBoogaloo]

I don't know why Diana thought that "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" would tug at the judges' heartstrings. It's not that kind of song. I would really like to know what in particular about that arrangement made Diana think that people would freak out over it.

 

Week after week, my love for Andrew grows. I agree that there is no reason for someone to audition for a song if they don't want it. There are always reasons why people don't want a particular solo. Sometimes it's out of their range. Sometimes it's a song they don't connect with. But the point is that these kids chose to join a choir, which is a group of people singing. I know people who were in choir who never had a single solo and it didn't bother them at all. They liked singing harmony and they liked being part of a group and that's what they wanted from the experience. Diana can rationalize all she wants that Blue only got a solo last week because she MADE him audition, but I don't think that justifies making everyone in the group audition every week. As one of the other members pointed out, it wastes time when the entire group has to sit there to watch eight people audition for a solo.

 

Diana is clearly one of those "my way of the highway" people. She has a shitty attitude. If these kids don't want to be yelled at or waste precious rehearsal time, then they should quit, rather than Diana making a single change to HER attitude. And to give them an ultimatum that anyone who doesn't like the way she wastes time should quit? Great leadership skills there. Then she had to be a total bitch and say that if they didn't want her, they could have Deke coach them. WTF? And then to go on and say that Deke doesn't work dynamics, tuning, choreography, or story is bull shit. Does she attend all of his rehearsals? Gawd. I do not believe her blatant lie that all she thinks about 24/7 is Highlands Voices. Yeah right. I was rolling my eyes when she said that she had to treat the group with kid gloves after the big blowout. Apparently not screaming at them is what she considers treating them with kid gloves.

 

I get why Deke wanted Stay Tuned to do something with a different emotion, and I think that it was a good exercise in accessing a wider range of emotions than their usual ballads, but I didn't enjoy the arrangement. the choreography. or the performance. But I was also cracking up at Diana clutching her pearls about how inappropriate it was.

[Beden]

 

The whole problem with Diana is that she cares more about beating Deke than about helping her group get good enough to win. Just the fact that she keeps calling them "Team Diana" instead of Highlands Voices is a dead giveaway. When they had a montage showing her trying to to coach the team over a few days, at one point she said something like "I will not lose to Deke!", she considers this her competition, not the groups competition.

I agree that this mess is completely scripted and plotted in advance (with the plucky underdogs likely winning at the end) but I can't help wondering if Ms Diana is in this simply to raise her personal  profile and--with any luck for her--get a few more jobs from the exposure. It makes sense to me but whether or not her ridiculous over the top BS will work for or against her would be a question.

[GaT]

Listening to Diana putting all the blame for coming in 2nd on Highlands Voices made me want to choke her. It couldn't be her arrangement, it couldn't be her choreography, on no, she's DIANA, the queen of acapella.

[Beden]

What made me both giggle and gag last night was that Ms D styled the girls as mini-me's; over sized sunglasses worn as headbands in place. It also looked like she was wearing a dress at the competition made out of the same fabric as the boys shorts. I kept wondering where and how they got the costumes if they threw that song together in less than a week. I can see the other group having a tie-dye party in someone's back yard--I guess--but buying or making those other costumes? And where did the $ come from? If I were a parent I'd be pissed about the ongoing added expense. (Okay, we know the production company made those arrangements...)

[SrPab]

AfterBuzz TV - S1E5 Review & After Show

 

I have no affiliation with AfterBuzz...just leaving it here for added perspective. As for the episode itself, it seemed like so much sound and fury signifying nothing, because both HV and ST survived and advanced. Their scores (81 for ST and 80 for HV, out of 90) meant neither was going to be "eliminated".

[Darian]

Diana was so ungracious onstage when they announced the second place finish. Such an ugly display. When she was dressing them down later, one kid has one of Stay Tuned's flowers  tucked behind his ear. I'm surprised Diana didn't have a "no wire hangers" meltdown. When I sang in chorus in school, I wanted the tough, mean teacher because I wanted to learn and be better. But Diana's ego overshadows the benefit of her toughness.      

 

I liked one kid saying his grandmother would like "Love Shack."