I watched parts of Idol Gives Back last night and was pleasantly surprised by some of the performances. Annie Lennox's cover of "Many Rivers to Cross" was amazing; Carrie Underwood sang a cover of George Michael's "Praying for Time" and showed that her Idolness was warranted. Other Idol Chris Daughtry visited Uganda and turned a village singalong into a plea for help for Africa. Fergie singing and cartwheeling while performing "Barracuda" with Heart was just a plain fun.

And even watching Teri Hatcher think she was Carrie Underwood was amusing. She fronted the Band from TV (with James Denton, Greg Grumberg, Bonnie Sommerville, Bob Guiney et al.) and sang "Before He Cheats" (I personally think that Jesse Spencer from House is even hotter than ever now that I know he not only looks good, but plays a mean fiddle, too.

But what I didn't get -- at all -- were the two performances and a lame skit with Billy Crystal commanded by Miley Cyrus, teen phenom and daughter of Billy "Achy Breaky" Ray Cyrus. Ok, I'm not in the Disney demographic but the 15-year-old wunderkind kinda sorta sucked at singing. First, do you think she's really 15? She looked and vamped around stage like at least at 17-year-old. Her songs weren't memorable, she was kinda pitchy in spots, and we couldn't tell if she were lipsynching that second performance. We don't think she'd even make it through American Idol's auditions. But the screaming preteens were as enthusiastic for Miley as they were for golly gee wiz kid David Archuleta. But at least Archuleta can sing.

Call me old-fashioned, but I'll take Britney Spears any day.

Miley's silhouette by Mark J. Terrill/AP Photo