I just got finished watching the Sunday Best finale and I am not surprised at all. My choice to win was Jessica. I’d like to send out a big congratulations to Y’Anna Crawley. She performed wonderfully throughout the entire competition.
I must say that the finale left me scratching my head a little bit. The two contestants sang a duet to New Edition’s “Can You Stand the Rain” that was arranged by Donald Lawrence. The arrangement/performance was nice, but it wasn’t gospel. Somebody please tell me why this song was part of the show. For Sunday Best to be a gospel show, there have been quite a few R&B performances this season.
Gospel music gets such little air time, I just don’t understand why the producers would use the little air time that gospel gets and have an R&B song performed. Just because Donald Lawrence arranges a song, that doesn’t make it gospel. Call me crazy, but I tune into a gospel music show to listen to gospel music. If I want to listen to R&B, I know where to find it.
Let me make one additional point about the duet. Just because two people can each sing well, that doesn’t mean that they should be doing a duet together. I’m sure you’ve seen a duet where it looks like the two singers are about to try to see which one can out sing the other. If you watched the show, there was a point in the song where Y’Anna start riffing and running and Jessica didn’t want any part of that. I can’t blame her at all. Their styles are too different. A Karen Clark-Sheard and Y’Anna Crawley duet would be a good idea. A Kiki Sheard and Y’Anna Crawley duet would be a good idea. A Jessica Reedy and Y’Anna Crawley duet is not such a good idea, especially when the song is “Can You Stand the Rain.”
The two contestants each gave good individual performances. Watching Jessica Reedy live must be a completely different experience than watching her on TV. She sang “I Surrender All”. The performance left BeBe Winans almost in tears and it left Erica Campbell speechless. Although I thought her performance was good, I didn’t have anywhere near the same emotional response that they did.
We also got to see the beginning of the BeBe and CeCe Winans reunion. There is a lot I can say about that, so I’ll save my comments for another post that is coming soon.
When people think of the words Sunday Best they think of someone who can walk in your church and sing the roof off. That is one of the big reasons why America voted in favor of Y’Anna Crawley. If the name of the show would have been America’s Next Gospel Star Jessica Reedy probably would have stood a better chance. I’m not completely sure why, but there are a lot of people already saying that they will not be watching season 3 of Sunday Best.
There is no dobut that Y’Anna Crawley is a derserving winner. She finished the show with her new single “The Promise” and it sounds pretty good. I’m not sure how much success Y’Anna and Jessica will have as gospel artists. I pray that they both achieve great success and do big things both in and outside of gospel. I can’t wait to hear each of their albums when they come out.


