David Archuleta - "Dean and David" the book!

Dean Kaelin, David Archuleta's voice coach, just finished compiling his notes from his experience working with David Archuleta on American Idol called: "American Idol and David Archuleta – an Insider’s view".

To get a copy (it's 60 pages!) -- please send $5 via PayPal to deankaelin@netzero.net -- tell him Rickey sent you. (Will help us get back in good graces! Ha-ooh!)

Here's an excerpt -- it's fascinating. I think it's a great look at David Archuleta's experience on American Idol behind the scenes:

Anyway, we were already with “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy” when I got a phone call from David’s dad on Friday February 22nd I think, just 3 days before David was supposed to tape the 70s show. He said, “We have had to change songs. I found out that “You’ve Made Me So Very Happy” was actually 1969 instead of the 70s.” Actually, I had known that since I was a big Blood, Sweat and Tears fan when I was a little kid, but figured somehow it must have qualified as a 70s song if it was on the list. David’s dad said that David still could sing the song since it was on the approved list that they had been given, but that he didn’t feel good about it because he didn’t want people to come back and say, “Hey, how come David got to do a song from the 60s when it was 70s week?” And David’s dad didn’t want anybody to think that David had received an unfair advantage.

But he said, I have good news. I just found out that “Imagine” by John Lennon has been approved and they are going to let David sing that. We were quite excited about that because David had sung this song several times when he was younger and knew it very well. He had even recorded it in my studio when he was 13 years old so we knew that he knew it well and was very comfortable with it.

We knew that this was going to be a good song for David, but we had no idea it was going to be such a great song for him. After the taping on Monday night I sent a text message to David’s dad asking him how it went. David’s dad texted me back saying, “The judges loved it. We couldn’t have scripted it any better.” When I saw the show on Tuesday night I knew what he had meant.

The only concern that we had had with “Imagine” was the lyrics. David and his dad wanted all the lyrics that David sang to be appropriate for David, his age and his beliefs. The first verse of “Imagine” talks about “no heaven” and “no hell” and the second verse says “no religion” and David didn’t feel comfortable singing those words. He decided he wanted to sing the third verse instead since it talked about “the brotherhood of man”. When I heard David sing this it sounded a little strange to me and I thought that it might sound strange to the judges too.