The great theater song And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going, is both a blessing and curse. If you sing it well, audiences will love you and leap to their feet and give you awards. But if you sing it too well, if you make too big a mark with it, if you really own it, it will own you as well. Jennifer Holliday who basically "created" the song has never escaped it's grasp and now it seems LaKisha has suffered the same fate. Nothing Lakisha sang on American Idol equalled the power of her singing "that song" in an early episode. She blew us away when she sang it but then everything since has been a letdown. Lakisha's journey on Idol is a mirror of the career of Jennifer Holiday and possibly Jennifer Hudson, who won an Oscar for singing it. It will be interesting to see if unlike Jenifer Holliday, Lakisha and Hudson can escape the pull of that powerful song, but I have my doubts. Will Hudson and Lakisha ever sing anywhere again without audiences begging to hear that song just one more time? My advice to Melinda Doolittle: never sing that song. Whatever you do, never sing that song!
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