I enjoy TV One's Unsung series immensely. Whenever I talk about episodes with people, the issue of whether the artist being profiled is truly "unsung" is usually debated.

For me, it doesn't matter. At this point "Unsung" is just the name of a television music biography series to me. How obscure, forgotten, or famous the person/group is doesn't really matter to me. If TVOne had outright superstars as Unsung subjects, that would be fine with me, as long as the artist has an interesting history and story, though, admittedly, it is nice to see more obscure artists profiled.

So, in your opinion, is there really some sort of standard? Has it changed over the Unsung seasons? Does it matter to you? Clearly, the term "unsung" can mean a LOT of different things, including (but not limited to):

1. Artists who, for the most part, never crossed over, though were and are always popular on black radio and within the black community generally. This could obviously apply to a lot of artists.

2. Aritsts who are generally known by a lot of people for a narrow range of their work, though they did much more - Ray Parker, Jr., for example -- known by many people only for Ghostbusters.

3. Innovators who don't always get credited with the role they played in the development/creation of muisical trend/style -- e.g., Whodini

4. Artists who are associated with other artists, but have a much larger story, or artists overshadowed by contemporaries. I guess I would put Shiela E in this category since for a lot of people she is associated with Prince -- but she's done so much more on her own. Also Mary Wells, for example.

5. Artists whose careers were cut short and left behind potential unfulfilled - Donny Hathaway, Tammi Terrell, for example.

6. Artists who simply are not going to be profiled anywhere else than in a series like Unsung -- Musical Youth, Fat Boys, Sylvester.

Okay, those are just off-the-top-of-my-head categories and are not meant to be exclusive. And, artists can obviously be unsung for multiple reasons.

Thoughts? What do you think the standards should be? Do you think there are artists who have been profiled who really aren't "unsung" and maybe someone else should have been profiled instead.

[Edited 4/2/12 12:37pm]