The fifth season of American Idol began on January 17, 2006 and concluded on May 24, 2006. Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell returned to judge, and Ryan Seacrest returned to host. It is the most successful season to date ratings-wise and also with 17 contestants (including all of the top 9 and a few semifinalists) getting record deals - nine of them with major labels. It is the first season with a male winner (Taylor Hicks) and a female runner-up (Katharine McPhee). It was also the first season of the series to be aired in high definition.
Auditions
Auditions were held in seven cities in the summer and early fall of 2005 in the following order:
- Chicago, Illinois
- Denver, Colorado
- Greensboro, North Carolina
- San Francisco, California
- Las Vegas, Nevada
- Austin, Texas (later stages of auditions were held in San Francisco because of Hurricane Katrina and the number of evacuees in Texas)
- Foxborough, Massachusetts (Greater Boston)
Unlike Season Four, no guest judges were involved during the auditions.
Top 12 finalists
Song themes
- March 14 ~ Stevie Wonder
- March 21 ~ 1950s
- March 28 ~ 2000s
- April 4 ~ Country
- April 11 ~ Queen
- April 18 ~ Great American Songbook
- April 25 ~ Love songs
- May 2 ~ Songs from Birth Year/Current Billboard Top 10
- May 9 ~ Elvis Presley
- May 16 ~ Clive Davis's choice/Judges' choice/Contestants' choice
- May 23 ~ Song previously performed by contestant/Another song previously sung by contestant/Original Song for American Idol 5 : "My Destiny" (McPhee) or "Do I Make You Proud" (Hicks)
Performers on results shows
- March 15 ~ Stevie Wonder
- March 22 ~ Barry Manilow
- March 29 ~ Shakira and Wyclef Jean
- April 5 ~ Kenny Rogers
- April 12 ~ Final 8 sing a medley of Queen
- April 19 ~ Rod Stewart
- April 26 ~ Andrea Bocelli and David Foster
- May 3 ~ Top 5 perform "Together We Are One" (originally written and sung by Australian singer Delta Goodrem for the 2006 Commonwealth Games)
- May 10 ~ Top 4 perform a medley of Elvis songs
- May 17 ~ Each contestant of the Top 3 performs the song they will be singing on the American Idol Season 5: Encores CD.
Elimination song
A new feature this year, the show now uses a special song to make a tribute to an eliminated contestant's journey on the show, as opposed to before when various different melodic music compositions were played. This year, the song used for an eliminated contestant's flashback tribute was "Bad Day" by Daniel Powter.
The finale
On the finale, Carrie Underwood sang "Don't Forget to Remember Me" solo along with the song "Through the Rain" with the 12 finalists. Also, the finalists performed two medleys: one medley was for the female finalists and the other for the male finalists. Several special guests performed with one of the top five Idols: Al Jarreau (Paris Bennett), Live (Chris Daughtry), Meat Loaf (Katharine McPhee), Mary J. Blige (Elliott Yamin) and Toni Braxton (Taylor Hicks). Clay Aiken performed with lookalike auditioner Michael Sandecki, who resembled Aiken circa his 2005 audition. Also, Prince performed without an Idol. Towards the end of the program, the finalists performed "That's What Friends Are For" with Dionne Warwick as well as other songs in the Burt Bacharach canon, with Burt Bacharach playing the piano. Several auditioners from the first round returned to accept "Golden Idol" awards, and to sing. A parody of Brokeback Mountain (though there was no mention of homosexuality) called "Brokenote Mountain," featuring a group of three failed auditioners (Layne Johnson, Michael Evans, and Matthew Buckstein) was replayed from the Hollywood round. The trio "The Brokenote Cowboys" then performed the Waylon Jennings & Willie Nelson song "Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys". In a pre-taped segment, finalist Kellie Pickler ate lunch with Wolfgang Puck at his brasserie as a way of making fun of Kellie's admitted lack of culinary savvy. Finally, just before the results were announced, Hicks and McPhee performed "(I've Had) The Time of My Life". The chairman of TeleScope Inc., the company which manages the American Idol results, came at the end of the show with the result card.
Semi-finals
The semi-finals began on February 21, with the names announced on February 15. There were three shows each week for the three weeks of the semi-finals.
There were no format changes from season 4; it featured 12 male singers and 12 female singers (24 total), with two of each being eliminated each week.
The semi-finalists, announced February 15, 2006, along with their songs performed on the show, were:
Female semi-finalists
Male semi-finalists
Elimination Chart
Prediction websites
DialIdol
Main article: DialIdolDialIdol is both the name of a computer program for Microsoft Windows and its associated website that began tracking contestants during Season 4 and sprang to prominence at the start of Season 5. The program allows users to automatically vote for the American Idol contestants of their choice using their PC's phone modem. The program then reports back to the main website, which keeps track of the results based on the percentage of calls for each contestant that result in a busy signal. Based on the data received, the website then predicts which contestants may be eliminated or may be in danger of being eliminated. As of May 25, 2006, its predictions for Season 5 were 87% accurate.
This was the first season in which the free U.S. public service website, Zabasearch.com, started to openly present voting results (starting with the top 12 and onward) that it claims are from Cingular and American Idol. It has experienced controversy over the fact that its results change throughout the day until (and often through) the results show.Controversy
Main article: American Idol controversy
- In January 2006, twins Derrell and Terrell Brittenum were charged with forgery and theft after allegedly using a false identity to purchase a car. This occurred after the "Hollywood" portion of the show was filmed, and the twins were subsequently disqualified.
- Simon Cowell said that he didn't like "last year's winner" as much as Kellie Pickler. He has since said that it was a heat of the moment thing, as Carrie Underwood had performed on the show the week before and was not very fond of the performance.
- In January 2006, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) expressed concern about the show's portrayal of some contestants: "The real offense here was in the producer's decision to add insult to injury by turning a contestant's gender expression into the butt of a joke." Damon Romine, Entertainment Media Director, on January 20.
- In January 2006 The National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, NAAFA accused the show of being discriminatory towards its plus sized contestants.
- In February 2006, it was discovered that José "Sway" Penala was reportedly signed to E-Real Records with his band 6th Day, at the time of his audition.
- Two rumors about finalist Katharine McPhee circulated during early March and throughout the season. The first was that she was quitting the show and wouldn't show up for the March 7th airing. The second was sparked by the loose fitting blouses she had been wearing, leading viewers to suspect she was pregnant. Katharine denied both rumors when interviewed by host Ryan Seacrest on the March 7th show.
- During the March 28 show while Mandisa Hundley was singing, her name and phone number came up, but changed for a few seconds and showed Taylor Hicks' name and phone number. At the end of the show the numbers were right.
- Mandisa Hundley was voted out after country week, whereby her rendition of "Any Man of Mine" was not well received as a good song choice. The reason behind her elimination was speculated to be what she said before she began to sing her rendition of "Shackles (Praise You)" by Mary Mary: "This song goes out to everybody that wants to be free. Your addiction, lifestyle and situation may be big, but God is bigger." Many viewers believed that the "lifestyle" stated was regarding the homosexual lifestyle, which she denied, clarifying that the lifestyle she was referring to was her lifestyle of addiction to food. Mandisa is a former employee of the Southern Baptist Convention, having joined the Convention in 2000 as a telephone sales representative for their LifeWay book division, and later in their women's enrichment events area, and later Beth Moore's Living Proof Live events. (Moore's books are published by LifeWay.)
- On the April 25 show, the theme of which was Greatest Love Songs and featured guest coaches Andrea Bocelli and David Foster, executive producer Nigel Lythgoe forced contestant Taylor Hicks to change his song a day before air time (and the same day as the dress rehearsal). Hicks' chosen song was "Try a Little Tenderness," but Lythgoe, in a radio interview, claimed the song was more appropriate for a Blues Brothers week and was not a song that Andrea Bocelli would sing. Hicks changed his song at the last minute to "Jus
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