Neal E. Boyd on to the next round?

I bet you Neal E. Boyd fans absolutely couldn't wait to see the end of the Olympic Games.

Tuesday night the games were over and the next chapter in Boyd's journey began. Now we just have to see how long the chapter will be.

If the judges' reactions were any indication of how far Boyd will go (and often, the judges' reactions are good indicators of who'll make it far) then we're in for the long haul. Out of all the contestants on the Los Angeles stage Tuesday night, Boyd (who, like in episode one, closed out the show) was probably the best received by Piers Morgan, Sharon Osbourne, David Hasselhoff and the live audience.

I was at the University Center on the campus of Southeast Missouri State University, where Neal's fraternity brothers from Lambda Chi Alpha were cheering him on at the community watch party.

When he started belting out "Somewhere" from "West Side Story" (in opera fashion, of course), there was definite excitement. Boyd went out on a limb again, trading in the aria for an American standard.

The "America's Got Talent" judges gushed over the performance. Judge Piers Morgan said it was "incredible. You have become the Michael Phelps of the competition."

Judge Sharon Osbourne told Boyd "I want to give you a great big hug."

Of course, his personal story helped. The show's producers gave Boyd plenty of face time and the tenor dedicated his performance to his grandmother, who recently died.

Most of the 10 contestants were pretty weak, in my humble opinion. Come Wednesday night, five of them will be sent home. I'm pretty sure Boyd won't be one of them, based on both his talent and his personality.

But we've got a ways to go. It will be interesting to see, if they show the results in such a fashion, just where the tenor ranks among the five who do move on.

The results will be announced Wednesday night. The show starts at 7 p.m. on NBC.

Poll results

After Boyd's last performance, I posted a poll asking you how it compared to the first. Here are the results:

Question: "Was Neal E. Boyd's first performance on "America's Got Talent," of the opera song "Nessun Dorma" better than his rendition of "Unchained Melody" during Las Vegas week?"

Yes: 62.3% (66 votes)

No: 9.4% (10 votes)

They were equally as good: 28.3% (30 votes)

Looks like you think his first performance was better. I'm posting a new poll question, asking you about what kind of songs Boyd should sing.

<form method="post" action="http://www.semissourian.com/scripts/poll/vote.php">Should Neal E. Boyd stick to arias (operatic pieces) or continue to put operatic turns on popular American songs? Arias

Popular songs

Both of them are amazing when he sings them.

I'm not a fan of either.

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