Latin American Idol is the Hispanic American edition of the international Idols franchise. First airing in 2006, the series was the first in the franchise to extend beyond the borders of a single country, open to contestants from Mexico, Central, and South America. The show was filmed in Buenos Aires and was transmitted to over 23 nations in the region via the Sony Entertainment Television network.
Premise Latin American Idol was filmed in Buenos Aires, Argentina and aired throughout Latin America with the exception of Brazil, which has its own version called Ídolos Brazil, premiered in 2006. Portuguese-language contestants can participate if they are able to sing in Spanish. The show's hosts are the Venezuelan Erika de La Vega and Argentine Monchi Balestra. In the first season the judges panel was made up by Jon Secada from the United States (born in Cuba), Gustavo Sánchez from Puerto Rico and Elizabeth Meza from Mexico, the last of this being replaced since the second season by Mimi, a former member of musical group Flans, and Oscar Mediavilla from Argentina, replacing Gustavo Sánchez for the fourth season.
This show is divided into four phases: auditions, theater/secondary audition stage, workshops and performances.
Auditions The first season's auditions took place in order in the cities of Caracas, Venezuela; Bogotá, Colombia; Mexico City, Mexico; and finally in Buenos Aires. Auditions took place between April–May, 2006. In the show's third season, Panama City, Panama was chosen as the fifth audition city, while in the fourth season San José, Costa Rica was chosen as an audition venue.
The stage of auditions was divided into two rounds:
The pre-audition: Actually there are two pre-auditions. Before performing in front of the cameras and in front of the real panel of judges of the show, another panel of judges evaluate the auditioners to decide if they deserve to perform in front of the real panel of judges and in front of the television cameras. The panel of judges that make these pre-auditions choose auditioners that sing well and that have some chances to convince the real panel of judges, or, who sing bad and make a funny moment for the show. The audition: After the pre-audition, the panel of judges of the correspondent season (from time to time there is a guest judge to be part of the panel of judges) listen to the auditioners and say their opinions. Then each judge say "Yes" or "No" to the auditioners. The auditioners needs two out of three "Yes" in order to go to the Theater stage. If the auditioner is in front of four judges, three out of four "Yes" will be needed in order to go to the Theater stage. If there are four judges and the auditioner only gets two "Yes", they ask the auditioner to leave the place so that soon after the panel of judges decide if the auditioner should go or not to go to the Theater stage. To pass to this stage, the auditioners are invited to the next stage in Buenos Aires with the phrase "Welcome to Latin American Idol". Over 100 persons are the ones who are told this phrase and are invited to the Theater.
Theater/second stage of auditions After performing for the panel of judges, successful contestants are invited to the next round of competition in Argentina.
Season 1
The first season was different from the subsequent ones because this was divided just into two rounds.
The theater stage was divided into two rounds:
Round 1: A performance in groups of three. The 100 contestants are split into groups of three's, according to gender. Sixty contestants are then selected to move on to the second round. Round 2: Solo performances. Each contestant is given four songs to perform, and the contestant selects one to perform. During stage of the competition, the panel of judges choose the top thirty contestants.
Seasons 2 and 3
The theater stage is divided into three rounds, that will be explained in-depth each one.
Round 1 - Auditions in lines: Approximately 100 contestants who got to the theater are split up in approximately 10 lines so that each one of the contestants performs again a cappella and with a microphone. Each contestant performs one by one. In the first season the contestants were split up in 3 groups, each group was put in a room, soon after, the panel of judges were going to each room to let the contestants know which of the three groups had made it to round 1. In seasons 2 and 3, after all the lines performed, the panel of judges call back each line and they call to the front to some contestants so that the line will be subdivided into two lines, then they say if the line at the front or the one at the back had made it, and which of them was cut out of the competition. Round 2 - Performances in groups: After the first stage, contestants are given a short break of some hours and then begins the second round. In the first season, it was the only in which this round was made in groups of three. They were split up by sex gender and there were groups of males and females. In the second season, contestants start grouping in couples (usually a male with a female) to sing in a duet. In the first and second season the panel of judges were choosing the contestants to sing in groups of two or of three. In the third season, in this stage, there were more females than males, thus, there was a kind of a party so that then can choose their partner. Females who didn't find a partner had to make a duo with another female. In this round they sing with music live. When finishing, each of the groups were being called and the panel of judges were saying if they had made it to the next stage. Round 3 - Performances in solo: After the first round, the panel of judges gives four songs to make contestants choose one of them, so that in the rest of the day and of the other day they prepare themselves memorizing the lyrics. This round is characterized because contestants usually forget the lyrics. They are also tired to practice because many of them should rehearse at night and don't sleep so well. All these factors affect the performance of many and they find it difficult to go to the next stage. The panel of judges say that it doesn't matter so much if contestants forget the lyrics, what they really matter is to label how they get back after being in a situation like that. When finishing this last round, the panel of judges organize the contestants into groups of five, in order to select the show's top thirty contestants.
Season 4
The theater phase is renamed the "Second stage of auditions" during the fourth season.
Round 1 – Auditions in lines: They are organized in lines of five people and each person with a microphone, sing a cappella, a song they choose (so that they can evaluate how well they know to choose their repertoire). The mechanism of selection is the same as in seasons 2 and 3: they call each line of auditioners, and tell some of the contestants to step forward so that they split up into 2 groups, then they say which line is the one who made it to the next round. Round 2 – Performances in solo: The judges give contestants four songs, so contestants have to choose one of them and they have all the rest of the day long and the early next day to try to memorize the lyrics. This round has a major difficulty, because of the time they have to prepare everything, not only to memorize the lyrics, but also to rehearse it and making it changes or everything necessary to give that song their own style, contestants usually forget the lyrics. In this round there was a particular case that a contestant, without knowing the results of that round, choose to give up. After all the auditions, the panel of judges call one by one to the contestants and tell them who are cut off and who goes to Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Workshops
Seasons 1, 2 and 3 The thirty semi-finalists are split up into three groups of ten semi-finalists each one. The workshops consist of a small stage in which there is a small amount of public and each one of the semi-finalists perform in front of a live studio audience. During the workshops, each contestant performs in a platform, after talking about him or herself in previously recorded video. In the first season contestants performed accompanied by a pianist. During subsequent seasons, a live band performed with the contestant.
In this stage there are 4 workshops. In three of them the public vote is necessary and one special that is fully based on the judges decision. Each group of ten of the 30 semifinalists make one of three first workshops (Of which each contestant was put randomly). The last workshop is the Wild Card show, in which is performed the people who are saved from the judges in the workshops.
In a usual workshop, each one of the semi-finalists performs in a platform singing any kind of song in Spanish of any kind. Before the semi-finalist performs, a video takes place to let viewers get to know better each one of the semi-finalists. During the performance, a small advertisement is shown up with the name and last name of the contestants and below it will show the name we should text and the telephone number to which we have to send the text message to vote for that person. Generally, the name that we have to text is the first name of the semi-finalist, in such a case that two or more of the 30 semi-finalists have the same name, we will have to text the last name of each one to vote. In so special cases people will have to text the nickname in text messages to vote for the semi-finalists, but this is so strange to happen. After finishing the performance, the judges express their opinion about the performance. When the workshop finishes, the voting lines get open. The public starts voting and the next day the results show of each workshop takes place. In this results show, the public decision is revealed. The top three semi-finalists become finalists. After the Hispanic America's decision is revealed, the judges rescue two of the seven semi-finalists that were not chosen by the public to participate in the last workshop, the Wild Card.
Because there are three workshops, 9 semifinalists go to the finals with the public's help. Latin American Idol's normal format shows that there should be just 10 finalists (This has just been fulfilled in the first season). Two people who are rescued from each workshop make 6 semi-finalists totally to participate en the Wild Card, from which the panel of judges just choose one of them. In the second and third season, there has been an irregularity in Wild Cards, because in the third workshop of each season, the panel of judges rescued surprisingly one contestant more of each workshop to participate in Wild Card. In the Wild Card, the panel of judges chose three semi-finalists to make them become finalists. Because of this irregularity, the second and third season have had twelve finalists instead of just ten. The semi-finalists who achieve to become finalists, will always keep the same name to make people vote for them.
Season 4