Scotty’s McDuet With McGraw

One of the highlights on the American Idol finale was when Scotty McCreery sang “Live Like You Were Dying” with Tim McGraw.  Scotty told Country Countdown USA’s Lon Helton it was a highlight for him too: “Besides winning, that was my favorite best moment on the show.  That was absolutely insane, incredible.  Being able to sing with somebody like him, and what a nice guy he was too.  I remember I was on stage rehearsing my song, and they pulled me and said ‘You’re gonna rehearse with Tim.’  I was a nervous wreck.  I walked back there and he greeted me like he knew me for ten years, and we were buddies, and he gave me advice.  He said, ‘Scotty, this is your show, I want you to shine, I don’t want to take anything away from it. So he let me pick the parts I wanted to sing, and just a great guy.”  Lon asked if Scotty has watched the video of the performance, and he said, “Too many times!  Over and over. There were a lot of moments that stood out.  With Tim I kept switching hands with my mic because I was so nervous.  So there were things I could pick out that no one else would notice.”

 LISTEN: 11-41 Scotty4

WEB EXCLUSIVE: Lon asked Scotty who chose the song for them to sing: “I think it was Tim.  Originally it was supposed to be me singing with Carrie and Lauren singing with Tim. Then they talked and it worked out where me & Tim sang together.  Either way would I’d have been just as happy. But it was a great experience working with Tim.”

Did you watch yourself every week? “I think we all did.  We learned to stay away from the blogs because we learned not everybody likes us.  But we went to YouTube to critique ourselves for the next week.  Eventually I realized I had to stop holding the microphone like a flute.  We had vocal coaches and performance coaches, but the arrangements were ours.”

Tags: mcgraw, scotty

Category: Audio