Entertainment

The final battle

( L - R )Christopher Martin and Noddy Virtue - winston sill photos

AND THEN THERE were two ... With the Rising Stars 2005 competition on its last leg, the last of the live studio performances took place at the TVJ studios on Sunday. It was down to 18 year-old Christopher Martin of Back Pasture in St. Catherine and 28 year-old Noddy Virtue of St. Elizabeth vying for the top spot.

Guest judge

The show featured three performances from each contestant with two of their own selections and a producer's pick. The night also featured a guest judge, Aisha Davis, who joined Clyde McKenzie and Anthony Miller in their usual spot on the couch.

By the end of the night, persons would have been hard-pressed to make predictions as to who would walk away with the Rising Stars title, $500,000 and recording contract next Friday. Both per-formers delivered at least one outstanding piece and two that could have been better, as they had previously shown what they were capable of.

Craving Martin

Martin, the first of the two to take the stage started out playing hard ball as he bowled for the ladies' hearts with Crave. Screams from the audience suggested that the toss had connected, however, it would not be his strongest performance of the night.

Martin's second piece, Kiss and Say Goodbye also did not provide the home run he needed to wrest the top spot from Virtue, and as Miller remarked, one hopes the song is not predicting Friday's outcome.

It was with his final piece, the producer's pick, that Martin displayed the right mix of performance and vocal skill. In delivering True Reflection he began seated on the stage floor looking alone and contemplative, a ploy which worked beautifully and brought him real redemption.

Virtue's performance was almost a reversal of Martin's. He began with his strongest piece of the night, Rod Stewart's Broken Arrow which Miller dubbed a "rocking performance". His performances of When You Love Someone and Hero were not as strong, however, though When You Love Someone was the stronger of the two.

So, at the end of the night, voters were left with two adept performers who seemed to be of equal strength, but on Friday there can be only one.