Lady Gaga parodies and tributes abound on the Interweb--some funny, some serious, some good, some not-so-good. But the school recital performance of "Paparazzi" by boy wonder Greyson Michael Chance just might be the best yet. As the teacher emceeing the Edmond's Sixth Grade Festival says at the end of Greyson's stunning piano performance, this mega-talented kid could even "teach Lady Gaga a lesson."
Greyson is bona fide prodigy (as his lovely original piano compositions "Stars" and "Broken Hearts" on his YouTube channel demonstrate), and his talents are being celebrated on a national scale now that his "Paparazzi" video--in which he bangs out the piano ballad while his classmates look on in shock and awe, mouths agape--has gone viral. As of this writing, the video has gotten more than 36,000 views so far, and he's even been invited to perform on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" this Thursday.
According to his bio on his YouTube profile, Greyson is "very inspired by Lady Gaga and Augustana." Greyson additionally explains: "Lady Gaga is a freak but she has so much talent and her style of music is what I would like mine to be when I'm older. Augustana is one of the most underrated bands I think ever to step [on] the planet. They have so much talent it is not funny. They have such a good concept with folk and rock. It is very sad that they are so unknown."
Greyson may look like a Justin Bieber clone with his sideswept-banged bowl cut, but with musical taste like that, clearly this boy is no prepubescent pop robot. This kid is deep. (His aforementioned original song "Stars" is about a woman who dies of cancer and meets her husband in heaven, for instance--not exactly "One Less Lonely Girl," huh?) Today's tween fangirls would be way better off worshipping a role model like Greyson over Bieber--and judging from the flustered way the girls react in the background of his recital clip, such wide-scale worship may not be far off. After Greyson's upcoming "Ellen" appearance, surely countless more tweens will be his biggest fans, following him until he loves them.