The X Factor (British TV series) series 6

The X Factor is a British television music competition to find new singing talent. The sixth series started on ITV on 22 August 2009 and was won by Joe McElderry on 13 December 2009. Cheryl Cole emerged as the winning mentor for the second consecutive year, the first time in the show's history that a mentor has won back-to-back series. The show was presented by Dermot O'Leary, with spin-off show The Xtra Factor presented by Holly Willoughby on ITV2. McElderry's winner's single was a cover version of Miley Cyrus's "The Climb". Public auditions by aspiring singers began in June 2009 and were held in five cities across the UK. Simon Cowell, Louis Walsh, Dannii Minogue and Cole returned as judges. This season was the first to be sponsored by TalkTalk after they took over the sponsorship from The Carphone Warehouse. For the first time, auditions were held in front of a live audience. Following initial auditions, the "bootcamp" stage took place in August 2009, where the number of contestants was narrowed down to 24. The 24 contestants were split into their categories, Boys, Girls, Over 25s and Groups, and given a judge to mentor them at the "judges' houses" stage and throughout the finals.
During "judges' houses", the 24 acts were reduced to twelve, with one act being eliminated each week by a combination of public vote and judges' decision until a winner was found. The live shows started on 10 October 2009. The acts performed every Saturday night with the results announced on Sundays. This was change of format from previous series in which the results were announced later on the Saturday evening. This series was sponsored by TalkTalk.

Judges, Presenters and Other Personnel

During series 5, it was rumoured that Dannii Minogue would not return as a judge for series 6. Spice Girls singer Victoria Beckham was reported as a replacement for Minogue. In June 2009, however, it was confirmed that Minogue, Simon Cowell, Cheryl Cole and Louis Walsh would all return as judges for series 6. Walsh missed the first results show due to Boyzone member Stephen Gately's sudden death and missed the second week due to attending Gately’s funeral.
Dermot O'Leary returned to present the main show on ITV, while Holly Willoughby returned as presenter on The Xtra Factor on ITV2. Brian Friedman returned to the show as creative director and Yvie Burnett returned as vocal coach.

Selection process

Auditions

Auditions were held during June and July 2009 across five cities: London, Birmingham, Manchester, Cardiff and Glasgow. In a change to previous series, auditions were held in front of a live audience due to the success of a similar system on Britain's Got Talent. However, Glaswegian auditionees had already been judged using the old format, meaning that they had to apply again, as their initial audition was void.

City	Date	Venue
London	22–25 June 2009	ExCeL Centre
Birmingham	29–30 June 2009	ICC
Manchester	3–5 July 2009	Manchester Central
Cardiff	9 July 2009	International Arena
Glasgow	12 July 2009	Braehead Arena

Bootcamp

As with the auditions, the "Bootcamp" selection stage was filmed in front of a live audience. Filming took place on 1 August at the HMV Hammersmith Apollo. Approximately 200 acts attended bootcamp. They were initially split into groups of three, and judges gave instant decisions on who would leave based on the group performances, bringing the number of acts down to 100. The judges then cut the number of acts down to 49, but called back three rejected female soloists to form a new girl group, Miss Frank, bringing the number of remaining acts to 50. Following a further set of auditions, the number of contestants was narrowed to 24. Originally, the group Trucolorz were chosen by the judges for the top 24 but were disqualified due to one of the group's members being too young for the show, and they were replaced by Harmony Hood.
The contestants were then split into the usual four categories before the judges discovered which category they would mentor for the rest of the competition. The Boys were mentored by Cole, Minogue had the Girls, Cowell mentored the Over 25s, and Walsh took charge of the Groups.

Judges' houses

Each judge had help from a guest judge during the "Judges' houses" stage. Will Young assisted Cole in Marrakesh, Morocco, Minogue had help from her sister Kylie Minogue in Atlantis, The Palm, Dubai, Boyzone singer Ronan Keating helped Walsh near Lake Como in Italy, and Cowell had help from Sinitta in Los Angeles. At Judges' Houses, each act sang for their respective judge, and each judge and their guest eliminated three acts, leaving 12 acts to perform in the live shows.
;Judges Houses Performances:

Acts in bold advanced

Boys:

Joe: "Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word"
Lloyd: "I'm Yours"
Daniel F: "Without You"
Ethan: "I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues"
Duane: "Closer"
Rikki: "You've Got a Friend"

Groups:

Project A: "What's Up?"
Kandy Rain: "Paparazzi"
De-Tour: "Tiny Dancer"
Harmony Hood: "Never Can Say Goodbye"
Miss Frank: "Respect"
John & Edward: "I Want It That Way"

Over 25s:

Olly: "A Song for You"
Treyc: "All the Man That I Need"
Daniel P: "Praying for Time"
Nicole L: "Up to the Mountain"
Danyl: "Fallin'"
Jamie: "Stop Crying Your Heart Out"

Girls:

Stacey S:"Over the Rainbow"
Stacey M:"Sometimes"
Rachel:"Nobody Knows"
Despina:"The Voice Within"
Lucie:"Anything for You"
Nicole J: "Lately"

Judge	Category	Location	Assistant	Acts Eliminated
Cole	Boys	Marrakesh	Will Young	Ethan Boroian, Daniel Fox, Duane Lamonte
Cowell	Over 25s	Los Angeles	Sinitta	Treyc Cohen, Nicole Lawrence, Daniel Pearce
Minogue	Girls	Atlantis, The Palm, Dubai	Kylie Minogue	Nicole Jackson, Stacey McClean, Despina Pilavakis
Walsh	Groups	Lake Como, Italy	Ronan Keating	De-Tour, Harmony Hood, Project A

Acts

Key:

Act	Age	Hometown	Category	Result
Joe McElderry	18	South Shields	Boys	Winner
Olly Murs	25	Witham	Over 25s	Runner-Up
Stacey Solomon	20	Dagenham	Girls	3rd Place
Danyl Johnson	27	Arborfield	Over 25s	4th Place
Lloyd Daniels	16	Treharris	Boys	5th Place
John & Edward	18	Dublin, Ireland	Groups	6th Place
Jamie Archer	34	Putney	Over 25s	7th Place
Lucie Jones	18	Pentyrch	Girls	8th Place
Rachel Adedeji	18	East London	Girls	9th Place
Miss Frank	21–25	Various	Groups	10th Place
Rikki Loney	22	Glasgow	Boys	11th Place
Kandy Rain	22–25	Various	Groups	12th Place

Live shows

The live shows began on 10 October 2009, and continued through to the finale on 12 December 2009. Starting with this series, the results shows were on Sunday nights instead of Saturdays as they were for the first five series. In another change to the format of previous years, the remaining finalists performed a song as a group at the start of each results show. As previously, each week had a different song theme. Beginning with the quarter-final of the live shows, with five acts remaining, each contestant would sing two songs. Up to the quarter-final, the two acts with the fewest public votes were in the bottom two and would sing again in the "final showdown". The songs they performed in the bottom two were of their own choice and did not necessarily follow that week's theme. The four judges then each chose one act from the bottom two that they wanted to be eliminated from the show. If each act received an equal number of judges' votes, the vote went to deadlock and the act with the fewest public votes was eliminated. From the quarter-final onwards, there was no bottom two and the act with the fewest votes was eliminated.

Musical guests

During each results show, either one or two guest artists would perform. Series 5 winner Alexandra Burke and Robbie Williams performed on the first live results show, with Whitney Houston and judge Cole on the second. Michael Bublé and Westlife appeared on the third week, and Bon Jovi and JLS performed in week 4. Leona Lewis and The Black Eyed Peas performed for week 5, while week 6 featured a performance from Shakira. Susan Boyle appeared on the show for week 7 along with Mariah Carey. Rihanna and Alicia Keys performed in the quarter-final with Janet Jackson and Lady Gaga appearing in the semi-final. Guests in the final were Robbie Williams, Michael Bublé and George Michael and Burke, JLS, Lewis, George Michael and Paul McCartney. In some weeks, the guest performers also mentored the acts in the run-up to that week's live show.
The choice of musical guests on The X Factor live shows had a significant impact on the UK Singles Chart. Of the seven singles that made number one from 18 October to 19 December, six of them had done so after having been performed on an X Factor live show the previous weekend. They were, in order: "Bad Boys" by Alexandra Burke, "Fight for This Love" by Cole, "Everybody in Love" by JLS, "Meet Me Halfway" by the Black Eyed Peas, "You Are Not Alone" by the finalists and "Bad Romance" by Lady Gaga. This impact was noted by several commentators. After "Bad Romance" became the sixth song to reach Number One off the back of a performance on The X Factor, James Masterton of Yahoo! Music called the show "a guarantor of Number One hits". Gennaro Castaldo of HMV remarked: "In an age when there are very few truly mass-audience platforms left, the X Factor has become pivotal for those labels and artists seeking to reach a family-based audience." Paul Williams, editor of Music Week, explained: "The impact of the programme's incredible numbers on music sales is all too evident, with the top end of the singles and albums charts week after week since the current season began heavily dominated by whoever has been on the show."