Danny Gokey in Portland, OR: Idol’s Summer Live Tour 2009 Kicks Off

Interview with Danny Gokey and Michael Sarver in Portland

Danny’s Twitter

Danny Gokey’s intro sets him up as some sort of Love Man, and he starts with one of his strongest songs from the season, Michael Jackson’s P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing). He engages the crowd — which never set down after Allison was done — in a call-and-response, and they’re right with him.

The second song, Santana’s Maria Maria, shows a side of Danny I had hoped he’d show during the season. Danny’s wife, Sophia, loved Latin music, and I always suspected he had some of that rhythm in him. I don’t know why it never came out during the season — maybe the themes just didn’t fall right for him — but it’s nice to see it come out here. And — surprise, surprise — he whips off his jacket and proceeds to show that he’s been working on his dancing. He’s no Ricky Martin, but he doesn’t look hapless like he occasionally did on the show. And the audience eats it up. Always good to reward someone who’s clearly put in some effort.

Third song is one he did on the show — Rascal Flatt’s What Hurts the Most. It gives some of the audience a break — they’re sitting down, but they’ve been up for five songs now, and this is a ballad — but they’re still audibly engaged, singing along and cheering loudly at the end of the choruses.

Danny’s the first singer to say much more than a variant on “How’s it goin’, Portland!” “Setting up his last song, he talks about losing his wife — one year ago in four days — and says “Don’t be defined by any tragedy, don’t be defined by any mistake. … It comes down to a choice. … If you ain’t gonna be defined by anything in your past, why don’t you make some noise?” Maybe he’s equal parts Love Man and Preacher Man, but, by now, the crowd is back on its feet for a second Rascal Flatts song, My Wish. (Think he’s got Nashville on his mind? Yeah, me, too.)

To this point, I would have said that the voters’ decisions and the show’s audience responded almost exactly in direct proporation to each other. You could make an argument that Allison should’ve taken the third spot instead of Danny, but it’d be a close argument — and there’d be a lot of people here (all of them waving their arms, their cell phones and their glo-sticks at the moment) who might disagree with you.

By Brian Mansfield . USA Today