First things first: today is the anniversary of a national tragedy, and that's something we'll never forget. Yet as somber as the occasion is, we've got another hour's worth of The Voice blind auditions to get to, and darned if they don't provide at least a little bit of a morale boost. It's uplifting to see more hopeful artists get a shot at realizing their dreams.

Picking up where last night left off, each of our coaches is trying to fill 14 open spaces on their team, all four having selected two artists on Monday. The first artist of the night is Adriana Louise, who tells a har...

Aside from a little case of deja vu, it feels pretty good to have The Voice back on our airwaves. Season 3 starts with our four superstar coaches taking the stage yet again, this time for a rendition of the Rolling Stones' classic "Start Me Up" - which A) sounds great and B) is a reminder that no other celeb panel on TV has the street cred that these folks do. Although I could do without the confetti. But let's get to the competition, shall we?

The coaches have 16 spots to fill on their teams this time, up again from last season's 12 (though they're going to be going into live shows w...

It's the day we've all been waiting for (since May, anyway): the premiere of Season 3 of The Voice. There's a lot to talk about this time around, as we're still catching our breath from the end of Season 2. This is the season that could either be an incredible boost to NBC, or we could be talking about it as the season that didn't quite work. There's only one way to find out, and that's by tuning in and seeing what happens.

Here are six things to watch for in this season of The Voice:

1. The ratings. How will The Voice perform in the fall? Not only is it going head-to-head with FOX...

A new season of NBC's The Voice is only one week away. As you prepare to meet the artists of Season 3, Big Red Chairs is looking back at the singers who captured your attention in Season 2 earlier this year.

Season 2 was won by Blake Shelton's finalist, Jermaine Paul. The runner-up was Team Cee Lo's Juliet Simms, followed by Team Adam's Tony Lucca in third place, and Team Christina's Chris Mann coming in fourth. But what's happened to them in the just under four months since we last saw them?

Winner Jermaine Paul was signed to a record deal with Universal Republic Records, through which...

Clint Eastwood made a surprise visit to the Republican National Convention in Tampa Bay, Florida to give a speech - and celebrities have responded to the actor's odd "empty chair" sequence in which he asked questions to an empty chair that represented President Barack Obama.

Eastwood begins talking to a chair around 3:15 in the video

Olivia Munn tweeted, "Clint Eastwood was talking to an empty chair at the RNC … No, that’s not the set up to a joke. It’s not even a joke."

Star Jones wrote posted, "I can’t believe I just watched Clint Eastwood turn into somebody’s DRUNK UNCLE HARRY on th...

The Voice has made significant changes for its upcoming third season, and producers are talking about the biggest change of all - new coaches - according to executive producer Mark Burnett, who addressed the media alongside coaches Adam Levine, Blake Shelton, Cee Lo Green and Christina Aguilera earlier this week.

According to Big Red Chairs: After NBC exec Bob Greenblatt talked earlier this year about wanting to incorporate the coaches' signature chairs into the battle round phase of competition, the show has done just that. In a new twist called "the steal," during the battles, the arti...

It wasn't all roses and sunshine behind the scenes when "The Voice" first debuted. Adam Levine and his co-judge Christina Aguilera didn't get along when they first met, the rocker reveals.

Last year Levine and Aguilera joined Cee Lo Green and Blake Shelton on the hit reality show, but the pop star and Maroon 5 frontman hit the headlines for the wrong reasons following speculation of a bust-up behind-the-scenes.

Although they produced hit song "Moves Like Jagger" together, the rumors persisted.

Levine reveals that when they first started working together they butted heads, but they worked...

Host Carson Daly welcomes us to The Voice finale. There have been three months of blind auditions, battles and live performances. Four contestants - Jermaine Paul, Tony Lucca, Chris Mann and Juliet Simms - have given everything they’ve got to win over their coaches and the viewing audience. The four celebrity coaches - Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Blake Shelton, and Christina Aguilera - have done their best to pick winning vocalists, and to nurture the musical talents to this peak point.

It’s all over but the two hours that our poor finalists will have to endure before discovering just ...

It’s the beginning of the end for the Final Four. Jermaine Paul, Tony Lucca, Chris Mann and Juliet Simms will face the audience to see who will win the title of this season’s The Voice. Host Carson Daly is excited, coaches Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Blake Shelton, and Christina Aguilera are excited, and the studio audience is frenzied.

Only the audience’s votes will be counted for the final vote. Each of the vocalists will sing three times; a solo, a duet with their coach, and a tribute to their coach, singing one of the songs their coach made famous.

The night begins with a look back at...

Some familiar faces joined the new during The Voice’s semi-final eliminations. Host Carson Daly welcomed special guests including Dia Frampton, Beverly McClellan, Vicci Martinez and Javier Colon, all of whom were last year's finalists.

The eight hopefuls, Tony Lucca, Erin Willett, Chris Mann, Jamar Rogers, Jermaine Paul, Katrina Parker, Lindsey Pavao, and Juliet Simms, battled it out on Monday’s episode, and discovered tonight what the coach judges and America thought of their efforts.

The process is a little complicated, involving 100 points for each coach to split between their team mem...

Miranda Lambert has taken aim at her former tour mate Eric Church after he openly criticized reality TV shows for churning out so many country singers and compared the genre to "American Idol gone mad."

Church slammed the industry during a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, claiming too many amateurs were being handed record deals simply from appearing on TV talent competitions like Idol and The Voice, on which Lambert's husband Blake Shelton is a mentor.

He said, "It's become American Idol gone mad. Honestly, if Blake Shelton and Cee Lo Green f**king turn around in a red chai...

Country music stars Carrie Underwood and Miranda Lambert look set to dominate the 2012 CMT Music Awards after landing a combined total of nine nominations.

American Idol winner Underwood leads the pack with five nods - her song Good Girl will go head-to-head with Lambert's Over You for Video and Female Video of the Year, and her unlikely duet with rocker Steven Tyler during a pre-Super Bowl party also earned her a mention in the CMT Performance of the Year category.

The Male Video of the Year will be a battle between the likes of Keith Urban (Long Hot Summer), Jason Aldean (Dirt Road An...

Christina Aguilera has laughed off reports she snubbed Justin Bieber when he appeared on her show "The Voice on Tuesday."

Bieber debuted a sneak peak of his new video for "Boyfriend" and then jumped off stage to greet the judges - Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Blake Shelton and Aguilera. After he hugged the blonde starlet, her smile turned into a look of disgust.

When news of her ice cold reaction spread on the internet, Christina tweeted, "Haha! The media loves spinning stories...Can't a girl have a little Bieber Fever after getting kissed by the Biebs?"

What do you think of Christina's re...

On Tuesday night's episode of "The Voice" Christina Aguilera was forced to make another difficult elimination decision. The previous night she stirred up some controversy by surprisingly kicking off favorite Jesse Campbell.

Last night, she knocked Ashley De La Rosa out of the competition while saving Lindsey Pavao because her performance of Mike Posner's "Please Don't Go" made the blonde pop starlet cry.

Meanwhile, on Team Blake Shelton, RaeLynn sang the country song, "If I Die Young," by the Band Perry. But it wasn't quite good enough for Shelton, who gave her the boot and elected to sav...

The producers of NBC's The Voice aren't making it easy: on Monday's performance show, an "instant elimination" forced two coaches to chop two artists before America's vote.

Neither the singers nor the coaches were fans of the surprise axe. Blake Shelton remarked that if he knew who was responsible for the idea, he'd kick them - and Team Blake's Erin Willett was quick to concur.

"I'm still unhappy with it. I think that's the worst thing we've done," said Team Christina's Chris Mann after the show.

Perhaps the only one to see any merit in the idea was Adam Levine, who remarked that it at...

It was decision time again on NBC's The Voice, this time for Team Adam and Team Cee Lo. Who did America save and who sung their last song Tuesday night?

For Team Adam, the bottom three were a trio of lovely ladies: Kim Yarbrough, Katrina Parker and Karla Davis. It was Katrina's heartbreaking rendition of No Doubt's "Don't Speak" that won her Adam's one reprieve.

On Team Cee Lo, facing elimination were Tony Vincent, Cheesa, and Erin Martin. Cheesa delivered a powerful version of Eric Carmen's "All By Myself" that earned her a second chance, despite Cee Lo first saying that his head was l...

Here's the latest on and around NBC's The Voice: Team Adam went head-to-head with Team Cee Lo, and I have my thoughts plus the artists share theirs post-show!

It was another entertaining night on The Voice on Monday, but perhaps even moreso because again, putting Team Cee Lo against...well, any of the other three teams really shows how distinct Cee Lo's ideas are. While Team Adam stuck with fairly simple setups (perhaps the most production came with the giant airplane wing that Karla Davis got to sing on), Team Red Zone had guitar players on stilts for Jamar Rogers and a whole Egyptian s...

Blake Shelton has taken aim at a TV blogger who poured scorn on teenage The Voice contestant RaeLynn following her performance on the TV talent show this week.

The 17 year old is part of Shelton's 'team' on the popular program and he was stunned when TV.com blogger MaryAnn Sleasman picked on her on Wednesday.

Posting a link to Sleasman's article on Twitter.com, in which the blogger stated, "RaeLynn has the voice that makes me cringe the hardest," the country star writes, "What kind of person is low enough to write mean things about a 17 year old girl just trying to do her best? This one.....

Last night America spoke on NBC's The Voice, sending two members of Team Christina and Team Blake home, leaving twenty artists to sing on.

Christina's team bid farewell to Sera Hill and Moses Stone, as Christina chose to save Ashley de la Rosa. Meanwhile, Blake kept Jordis Unga and lost Charlotte Sometimes and Naia Kete.

The results came after a new part of the show this season: a "sudden sing" where the bottom three got a chance to perform for their coach's save (as opposed to last season, where a coach selected one based on their previous live performance).

Some of America's votes we...

Here's the latest on and around NBC's The Voice: my blog goes live with a recap of and interviews from the first live show of season two!

For the next six weeks, it's all about the live shows. Last night, Team Christina Aguilera and Team (Recent CMA Award Winner) Blake Shelton took the new and improved stage at Warner Bros. to sing for their survival, and by the time you read this you'll have just hours to vote before three artists from each team will be sent packing. (Voting closes at 10 AM EST; vote now!)

On to the recap...

The first live show had everything: some truly great perform...

Miranda Lambert, Jason Aldean and Kelly Clarkson scored two trophies each at Sunday night's Academy Of Country Music Awards.

But Taylor Swift won the coveted Entertainer of the Year prize for the second year in a row. She told the audience, "Thank you so much to the fans who voted for this. I am so happy about this."

The singer looked beautiful and more mature, wearing heavier than usual make-up and a white shift dress with metallic accents.

The main ACM winners were:

Entertainer of the Year - Taylor Swift

Male Vocalist of the Year - Blake Shelton

Female Vocalist of the Year - Miranda...

Here's the latest on and around NBC's The Voice: I talk with Moses Stone, Naia Kete, Orlando Napier, Justin Hopkins and Tony Vincent so you can get to know them beyond their battles!

Last night's final round of battles featured some of the most interesting yet. Before they aired, I had a chance to sit down with several of the performing artists. Here's what they had to say.

Moses Stone

Team Christina / Twitter: @IAmMosesStone

I wouldn't know hip-hop if it came up and smacked me in the back of the head. But you don't have to know the game to respect the player. Moses Stone is making hi...

We're down to the last battle rounds on The Voice. The last chance for hopeful artists to grab a spot in the live shows. (Can you believe we're headed into the last phase of the competition already? How time flies when you're singing your heart out!)

The night kicks off with Team Cee Lo: Wade vs. James Massone, with Cyndi Lauper's "True Colors." On first instinct, this might be a mismatch. But it wouldn't be the first time The Voice turns something that doesn't blatantly match into something special. James has his nerves get the better of him, and hesitates in first rehearsal, then ...

More than 19 million viewers tune in weekly to watch the good-natured rivalry between Blake Shelton and Adam Levine on NBC's hit singing competition show, The Voice, which features Shelton, Levine, Christina Aguilera and Cee Lo Green as they develop fresh musical talent. On the surface Shelton and Levine appear to be polar opposites. "We're like Thelma and Louise," jokes Levine, "but dudes!"

The strapping 6'5" Shelton, 35, is an avid hunter who lives in his native Oklahoma with his new wife, fellow country star Miranda Lambert. Rocker and L.A. native Levine, 33, a lean 6', went to elem...

Blake Shelton has invited a girl he kicked off TV talent show The Voice to join his backing band.

The "Honey Bee" singer picked wannabe Gwen Sebastian to be part of his team on the show, but he had to let her go during an episode which aired on Monday night.

But Sebastian has landed a cool consolation prize - Shelton has asked her to tour with him.

She'll hit the stage with his band for several upcoming dates, and Sebastian will join Shelton onstage at the Academy of Country Music awards show on April 1.

Here's the latest on and around NBC's The Voice: Dia Frampton rocks Los Angeles, plus meet Team Adam's Nathan Parrett and Katrina Parker!

A reminder: if you missed any of last night's battle round action, you can read my recap, and don't miss my interview with Jewel on mentoring Team Christina.

Dia Frampton may not have won The Voice, but she's found plenty of success after the show. She released her album Red last year and joined her coach, Blake Shelton, on his "Well Lit and Amplified" Tour this spring.

But just because she hit the national stage on the show doesn't mean she's become...

We're now halfway through battle rounds on The Voice. There have been some fantastic battles so far - so who's next?

Well, that'd be Team Adam (yay!). My coach gets right down to business, matching Pip vs. Nathan Parrett, and sending them off with Amy Winehouse's "You Know I'm No Good." Nathan is a little intimidated by the fact that Pip got all four coaches to turn for him, which is understandable, but kind of hilarious because in practice, Pip thinks Adam might be favoring Andrew, so it all evens out. Pip gets to work with Alanis, while Nathan gets Robin Thicke. The latter result...

As The Voice continues its third week of battle rounds tonight, Team Christina's hopeful artists will be taking more pointers from Jewel. The Grammy-nominated singer recently stopped by to chat about her experience on the show.

It's not Jewel's first brush with reality TV: in 2007, she was a guest judge on American Idol as well as the host of Nashville Star. The next year, she became one of the judges on Nashville Star. And last year, she was both judge and co-host of Bravo's songwriting competition Platinum Hit.

Here's what Jewel had to say about joining Christina Aguilera's team for thi...

Here's the latest on and around NBC's The Voice: hear what Juliet Simms, Kim Yarbrough and Lee Koch had to say before their battle round performances!

If you missed any of last night's battles, you can read my recap here.

Juliet Simms

Team Cee Lo / Twitter: @JulietSimmsALL

Don't let appearances fool you: Team Red Zone's rocker Juliet Simms is surprisingly sweet and outgoing. She is more likely to make you laugh with how funny and approachable she is.

"This is all I've ever done my entire life. This is my huge passion," she told me. That passion came through in her blind audition vers...

Last week's first round of The Voice battles was fantastic, so my expectations for week two were pretty high. Those expectations were definitely met.

Team Christina starts it off, with Geoff McBride vs. Sera Hill, armed with Aretha Franklin's "Chain of Fools." It's an interesting match of artists with a "big song," as Christina herself puts it. Sharp choice, Ms. Aguilera. Geoff draws Lionel Richie as his advisor, and has to take a moment before they start rehearsing. Lionel is floored by the volume of Geoff's vocals, but wants him to make sure he conveys personality and character. ...