Idol Chatter & Voice Views

The American Music Theater in Lancaster just announced six new shows.

Among them, Jason Castro, Idol’s fourth-place finisher in season seven, will perform a 7 p.m. show on Sunday, Feb. 27.

Tickets are $25 and go on sale Tuesday to AMT members and on Saturday, Dec. 11, to the general public.

You can head here for more information.

For those of you who have lost track of Jason since Idol, he’s been busy.

He released a self-titled album last spring that included a couple of his signature songs from Idol (“Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “Hallelujah”) as well as some impressive originals (“That’s What I’m Here For”). Here’s a link to my review.

Since then, he’s repackaged five of those songs and added five new ones for a second CD titled “Who I Am” that was released last month. And he’s released an EP of live studio performances, including a version of Tom Petty’s “Learning to Fly” that sounds like Jason was born to sing the song.

The newest CD is being pushed to Christian radio. And one of the songs on it, “You Are,” has cracked onto Billboard’s Christian songs chart.

Bottom line: Jason’s post-Idol efforts have been a bit hit and miss.

But when they hit, he’s a pleasure to listen to.