Idol Chatter & Voice Views

Lucia Flores-Wiseman performs for Team Adam during the playoffs on The Voice. (NBC Photo)

The pre-taped playoff performances for Team Adam on The Voice aired tonight.

Adam advanced five singers to the playoffs and had to pick two semifinals.

His choices were

Did he chose correctly? Here are Voice Views’ song by song grades for the night’s performances.

Lucia Flores-Wiseman, 22, of Maple Valley, Wash., “In My Life” by The Beatles

The blinds: Performed “La Liorona” and turned 4 chairs.
The battles: Performed “My Funny Valentine” and won her match with Hayden Grove.
The knockouts: Performed “Slow it Down” by Benson Boone and won her match with Grace Miller-Moody.
The playoffs: Nice simple arrangement of a lovely song, and it does a lovely job of putting Lucia’s distinctive tone front and center. My only suggestion: Eyes open, Luica, and a heartfelt vocal like that will be even more powerful. Here’s hoping she advances on this very talented team. Grade: A–

Conor James, 28, of Bridgewater, Mass., “Pink Pony Club” by Chappell Roan

The blinds: Turned 4 chairs with “I Say a Little Prayer”
The battles: Performed “How Deep Is Your Love” and won his battle with Tinika Wyatt.
The knockout: Performed “Forever Young” by Alphaville to win his match against Darius J.
The playoffs: Loved the vocal while Conor was sitting at the keyboard. That performance was great fun from start to finish. Just check out Conor’s outfit. That said, the vocal suffered noticeably once he started all the movement around the stage. Grade: B+

Kolby Cordell, 32, of Ontario, Calif., “Finesse” by Bruno Mars

The blinds: Performed “Never Too Much” by Luther Vandross and turned 2 chairs.
The battles: Performed “Tacones Rojos” and won his battle with Pablo Herrera.
The knockout: Performed “Lately” by Stevie Wonder. Lost his Team Legend battle with BDii, but was stolen by Adam Levine.
The playoffs: Nice upbeat performance and nice stage presence from Kolby. But I’m not sure the song played to his vocal strengths. We’ve already heard two better vocals from Team Adam, so that might be Kolby’s last chance on The Voice stage. Grade: B–

Ethan Eckenroad, 27, of Roaring Spring, Pa., “The Night We Met” by Lord Huron

The blinds: Performed “Northern Attitude by Noah Kahan and turned 4 chairs
The battles: Performed “July” by Noah Cyrus and won his match with Fran Posla.
The knockouts: Perfomred “I Won’t Back Down” by Tom Petty and won his match with Trevon Dawson.
The playoffs: Wow, love the plaintive tone of Ethan’s voice on this song. And the breaks in his voice add to the haunting beauty of that performance. That’s my favorite vocal from either team so far tonight on The Voice. Very well done. And I thought Ethan was a longshot at the semis. No longer. Grade: A

Britton Moore, 21, San Antonio Texas, “Somewhere Only We Know” by Keane

The blinds: Turned 4 chairs singing “Yellow”
The battles: Performed “Creep” and won his battle with Darius J.
The knockouts: Performed “Free” by the Zac Brown Band and won his match against Ari Camille.
The playoffs: Great, the backdrop that was so distrating during Iris Herrera’s performance is back for this one. Britton has heartthrob potential and is showing off nice range on this song, but the vocals a bit hit-and-miss. He does end on a strong note. Grade: B–

Decision time for Adam. Hoping he advances Lucia and Ethan. They both fall into the singer-songwriter vein, but they also have the most signature voices on his team.

Adam advances Lucia and Kolby. Okay, truly baffled by that. I thought Kolby’s performance was one of the night’s weakest. And he was the new member of a team full of four-chair turns who had been with Adam since the start of the competition.

Wow.