I’ve blogged a lot about vocal health, how to take care of your voice, what to do if you are sick, when not to sing etc…  But then there is a certain reality, sometimes you have to sing anyway, whether your voice is healthy or not and that is what happened to Paige Miles, and due to that unlucky course of events, she has been voted off the show.  Unfortunately, everyone has short term memory in show business.

She started off the show strong with Simon Cowell telling her she had the best voice of the bunch.  Two weeks ago she got laryngitis.  Now just imagine this.  You are there for a chance of a lifetime and you laryngitis.  Under any other point in her life she would have been commanded to vocal rest by a doctor so that her chords could heal and recover properly.  This really takes a couple of weeks with laryngitis.

But, due to the circumstance she had to produce, this was her opportunity and moment, she had to sing. She probably was under doctors care and had some sort of steroid shot to get through her performance, (I’ve had to have that done).  I will tell you from personal experience, that it can get you through an important sing but you don’t get 100% out and it takes much longer to recover your voice long term then it would have without it.

Considering all that, I think she was able to do quite well last week.  But, unfortunately she paid for it with her voice this week.  It was so unstable and off.  Her poor chords sounded pretty fragile and abused.  They were just not “themselves”.

And sadly, she had to be judged anyway- “the show must go on”, as they say.  Everybody just judged her pitchy voice and was forgetting what they were going through.  Very sad for her.  It was just a stroke of bad luck, and sadly that happens in life.  You break your leg before a sports event, get sick on vacation, or laryngitis on American Idol- luck is just luck good or bad.

I just wish they could have given her more credit and have been clearer about why her voice was not producing.  They gave her compassion for her voice when she sang well the week before with the laryngitis, but acted like there was no excuse this week, 1 week later.

People always support you when you do well through a tough period, but sometimes things are tough and you can’t do well.  I am frustrated that they don’t have someone on that panel standing up for the “voice”.  You’ll find that the “people in charge” just want you to sing well, no excuses, not even the excuse of laryngitus. Excuses, to them are problem people- no matter the circumstance, no matter how unfair.

This business is tough and can be pretty ugly sometimes.   Thank God the singing can be so satisfying to balance it out.   Get yourselves a good support team around you of family and friends.  Be strong Paige Miles you are very talented.

written by Ariella Vaccarino creator of Voice Lessons To Go (singing lessons on CD) and author of Vocalize!

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