Christina Aguilera and CeeLo Green Return to ‘The Voice’

Adam Levine, CeeLo Green, Christina Aguilera, Blake Shelton, Carson Daly
'The Voice's' Adam Levine, CeeLo Green, Christina Aguilera, Blake Shelton, and Carson Daly (Photo by: Mark Seliger/NBC)

It’s official: Christina Aguilera and CeeLo Green will be returning to the revolving judges chairs for the upcoming fifth season of NBC’s The Voice. If you remember back when it was first announced they’d be taking time off from judging/coaching the singing competition series, NBC said both coaches would be returning to the show. And NBC kept its word – Aguilera and Green are both signed up for season five.

That means that, unfortunately, Shakira and Usher will not be back as coaches this spring. However, Adam Levine and Blake Shelton are both set to return so at least we’ll still be able to witness their ongoing bromance. And in even better news for fans of the rookie coaches, NBC says Shakira and Usher will return for season six alongside Levine and Shelton.

“We locked in a plan several months ago to have the outstanding Christina Aguilera and CeeLo Green rejoin Blake and Adam for cycle 5, and we’re pleased to announce that the original four coaches are going to be back together in the fall,” explained Paul Telegdy, President of Alternative and Late Night Programming, NBC Entertainment. “They’re the reason this show was launched so strong for the first three cycles and we owe them a debt of gratitude. And after careful consideration of everyone’s schedules for next spring, we are excited to be returning the current cycle of coaches — Shakira and Usher along with Blake and Adam — for cycle 6, which will premiere after the Winter Olympics.”

“I am so thrilled that our Voice family has grown from four coaches to six,” added executive producer Mark Burnett. “This show thrives on the ability of our coaches to continue to balance their enormous music careers with working on The Voice to coach some of the best undiscovered talent in America. The coaching panel of Christina, CeeLo, Adam and Blake was at the heart of this show in its first three seasons and we are so lucky to have found equal success with Shakira and Usher in season four. Our best seasons are ahead of us.”

Season four of The Voice has been averaging 14.5 million viewers on Monday nights and 13.4 million on Tuesday nights.

And in case you haven’t caught on to The Voice, here’s the details [courtesy of NBC]:

The show’s innovative format features four stages of competition: the first begins with the blind audition, then the battle round, the brand new knockouts and finally, the live performance shows.

During the blind auditions, the decisions from the musician coaches are based solely on voice and not on looks. The coaches hear the artists perform, but they don’t get to see them — thanks to rotating chairs. If a coach is impressed by the artist’s voice, he/she pushes a button to select the artist for his/her team. At this point, the coach’s chair will swivel so that he/she can face the artist he/she has selected. If more than one coach pushes their button, the power then shifts to the artist to choose which coach they want to work with. If no coach pushes their button, the artist is eliminated from the competition.

Once the teams are set, the battle is on. Coaches will dedicate themselves to developing their team of artists, giving them advice, and sharing the secrets of their success along with the help from their celebrity advisers. During the battle rounds the coaches will pit two of their own team members against each other to sing the same song together in front of a studio audience.

After the vocal battle, the coach must choose which of his/her singers will advance to the next round of competition, while the losing artist is available to be stolen by another coach. Each coach has two steals during the battle rounds.

At the end of the battles, only the strongest members of each coach’s roster remain and proceed to the new knockout rounds. The artists will be paired again with a member of their team, but this time they find out only minutes before performing who they are being compared against. The artists each select their own song to perform individually, while their direct competitor watches and waits. They are vying for their coach’s confidence and decision to take them to the live shows. Their coach will choose the winner and the artist not selected will be sent home.

In the final live performance phase of the competition, the top artists from each team will compete each week against each other during a live broadcast. The television audience will vote to save their favorite artists and the two artists with the lowest number of votes will be sent home each week. In the end, one will be named “The Voice” and will receive the grand prize of a recording contract.