Chapter 9, Second Round of Selection (Bonus Chapter)

On the other side, Ling Wei was engrossed in filling out forms.

A system notification sounded: "Weiwei, Qu Chen went to get your phone. He's planning to install a listening program on it."

Ling Wei didn't even look up, her pen still moving: "I'm just afraid he won't pretend."

Otherwise, why would she have gone to such lengths to provoke her like that?

Bai Wanqing carefully performed in front of the phone, which helped her establish her persona.

Ha, now add her to the list.

Let this kid see for himself what a real idol is!

This large-scale cultural and tourism integration project, jointly created by the provincial television station and multiple online platforms, was ultimately named "Dream of Qinghe: Idol Open Competition".

It is not just an idol competition, but also a large-scale reality show that deeply integrates local characteristics and records the journey of young people pursuing their dreams.

The program aims to create a new generation of idol groups that truly originate from Qinghe and can represent the youthful vitality of Qinghe through open selection, and to take this opportunity to showcase the natural scenery and cultural heritage of various places in Qinghe in a panoramic way.

The project is open to the public for open auditions, but there is one core rule: participants must be amateur groups, and artists or trainees signed with professional agencies are not allowed to participate.

This clause aims to prevent projects from being monopolized by major entertainment companies and becoming a game of capital, while also aiming to truly discover voices rooted in the local community and full of original charm.

This regulation opened the door for Ling Wei and her teammates, who had just shed their fake girl group identity and regained their freedom.

After the preliminary registration ended, the first round of qualification review began in earnest, mainly to verify the applicants' status as ordinary people and their relevant talent certificates.

Next comes the more crucial second round of mentor evaluation.

In this round, a team of professional mentors hired by the program team will conduct a preliminary assessment of the dance and vocal abilities of the contestants who have passed the initial review.

This segment is designed to filter out internet celebrities who are only trying to attract attention and gain popularity but have no artistic talent and may disrupt the overall atmosphere of the show. Considering the amateur nature of the contestants, there are no strict requirements for their composition and arrangement abilities.

The initial evaluation by mentors was held in the provincial television station building.

Several rehearsal halls and meeting rooms on both sides of the corridor were temporarily requisitioned and transformed into evaluation rooms. The contestants, holding number tags, moved through the corridor under the guidance of the staff. The noise was loud and bustling, conveying a sense of tense busyness.

The evaluations were not conducted sequentially, but rather simultaneously in multiple rooms to accommodate the large number of candidates.

Each evaluation room is equipped with judges for both vocal and dance performances, who are required to score the contestants' performances simultaneously.

In one of the evaluation rooms, Lin Sheng, the principal dancer of the provincial dance troupe who had been brought in to be a judge, picked up an application form.

"...The silver medal in the amateur children's Latin dance category of the Golden Gourd Cup, jointly organized by Fularji County, Qiqihor City, and Qiezihe District, Qitai City, Dongshan Province, Xia Kingdom?!"

He looked utterly bewildered. What was going on with this review process?!

How could they let this in?!

However, he still maintained good manners. Now they are partners with the government, and their words and actions represent the dignity of the government.

He forced a smile and said to the man in the center of the room, "Please begin your performance, dance and vocals."

The person across from me started swaying slightly, slightly tipsy: "Fake cigarettes, fake alcohol, fake friends, fake friends. Fake feelings, fake tenderness..."

Lin Sheng: "..."

Su Han, a vocal judge and soprano singer from an opera troupe, started frantically picking at her manicure.

After the other person finished singing, Lin Sheng stared at him for three seconds in silence before squeezing out a question through gritted teeth: "Excuse me... what about your Latin dance?"

"Oh, that?" the man said matter-of-factly. "I learned it when I was a kid, but I've long forgotten it! How about a Yangko dance? I've even prepared a red handkerchief!"

Push it out!

Lin Sheng's facial muscles twitched slightly, but he said politely, "Okay, understood. Please go back and wait for further notice. Next."

There were also experts who, starting with a heavy sigh, bowed deeply:

"Thank you to the judges for giving me this opportunity."

When he looked up again, his face was full of stories. "My family... has been in a very difficult situation (sniffs)."

“From a young age, my mother told me (trembling voice)…”

Lin Sheng and Su Han: "......"

It felt like I was at the recording studio of a major music variety show.

"Next."

However, the scene was truly filled with experts.

"I'm from southern Yunnan! From the Nujiang River region of southern Yunnan!..."

"Next!"

"One region's water and soil nurture its people—a saying from Jincheng goes..."

"Next!!!"

"Dinosaurs fighting wolves..."

"Next!!!!"

"..."

After a morning of browsing, Lin Sheng felt as if he had been forced to fast-forward through a collection of the year's most popular memes in just a few hours.

During his lunch break, he couldn't take it anymore. He rushed to a corner of the corridor and dialed the qualification review team's number, growling in a low voice, "Hey! Wang Qian! Did you buy a few donkeys that kick you in the head every day?! How did these people even pass the preliminary review?! This place has turned into a torture chamber for internet memes!"

Wang Qian, the reviewer on the other end of the phone, was equally overwhelmed. She was responsible for both qualification review and preliminary filing of contestant information, and the mountain of application forms in front of her was almost overwhelming her.

She yelled back into the phone, "What can I do?! It's written in black and white in the document that as long as you can provide compliant supporting documents, you'll be approved in principle! Do you know how many people applied this time?! I've reviewed over eight thousand applications just for the initial screening! My eyes are almost blind! How about we switch?!"

Oh... more than eight thousand copies.

Hearing that someone was in a worse situation than him, Lin Sheng suddenly felt much better.

"Fine, fine, you're busy, you're busy." He hung up the phone, feeling that he could calmly face the hordes of troublemakers that afternoon again.

During lunch break, the other judges chatted about the promising young talents they had discovered: teachers from a certain dance institution, vocal students from a certain university…

When asked about his gains, Lin Sheng replied expressionlessly, "None so far."

The other party exclaimed in surprise, "Teacher Lin, I know you have high standards, but we can't come up empty-handed!"

Lin Sheng: "..." He suspected that all the abstract artists in the room had gathered in his room.

By the afternoon, Lin Sheng and Su Han were completely numb.

They really didn't discriminate against any style. The girl singing "Old driver, take me with you" had a clear and distinctive voice, and they approved her, didn't they? But someone who dances "social shake" while singing "cleaning windows," is that really acceptable?!

This is about selecting idols, not a hodgepodge of folk art!